Fall/Winter Timetable

POL462H1S L5101

Graduate Course Code: POL2313H1S L5101

Parties and Party Systems: A Canadian Perspective

Themes

Political parties and party systems in North American, European and other democracies. Electoral systems, problems of representation, electoral reform, voting behaviour and elections, processes of political change and democratic transition.

Texts

NOTE: Many books for this course are available online, through the university website, or via Google Books. Here is a list that I recommend that you purchase, though there are others that you may wish to purchase for future reference.

Downs, Anthony. 1957. An Economic Theory of Democracy. New York, NY: Harper, Haidt, Jonathan. 2012. The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion. New York, NY: Random House,

Kahneman, Daniel. 2011. Thinking, Fast and Slow. New York, NY: Random House, Aldrich, John R. Why Parties? A Second Look. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, Flanagan, Tom. 2007. Harper’s Team: Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power. Montreal, PQ: McGill-Queen’s University Press,

Levendusky, Matthew. 2009. The Partisan Sort: How Liberals Became Democrats and Conservatives Became Republicans. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, Hibbing, John R., Kevin B. Smith, and John R. Alford. 2014. Predisposed: Liberals, Conservatives, and the Biology of Political Differences. New York, NY: Routledge.

Format and Requirements

Seminar format; participation is expected (10%); three ten-page papers, worth 30% apiece.

Prerequisites

POL214Y1 or POL214Y5 or POL224Y1 or POLB50Y3

Exclusions
POL462Y1