Political Science

This course examines debates around a number of contemporary issues in Irish politics. These primarily center on institutional and behavioral issues, such as the constitution, the parliament, political culture, and elections. These debates are placed in a comparative context, using the experience of other countries to assess the Irish political system.

This course examines the practice of politics in the United States in the age of mass communications technology. A variety of disciplinary perspectives are employed, ranging from political science and history to cultural studies. Students examine and analyze the ideological, partisan, economic, and constitutional priorities of the main actors involved in the transmission of political messages and journalistic reporting, and learn about the tensions and conflicting agendas that complicate these interrelationships. Students also examine the goals of, and interaction between, politicians and film producers/directors in order to understand how political messages and ideological bias affect Hollywood and how film producers attempt to influence Washington.

This course examines the social, political and cultural history of contemporary Spain. Topics covered include the birth of contemporary Spain, the war of independence, the transition between the old regime, absolutism and liberalism, colonial independence, the formation of the state, restoration, and social economic and political systems. Assessment is based on attendance and participation, midterm, and final exam.

This course examines a broad range of American cultural production (including short stories, essays, journalism, poetry, music, films, theater, and television shows) and historical precursors focused on the issue of economic inequality and the impact these have had on culture. Topics covered include: Hamilton and Jefferson-- two visions of America; the Gilded Age and the industrial jungle; the progressive era; the Great Depression; economics of race in the United States.

The course offers a practical analysis of the role of accountability and transparency for the stability of post-conflict transitions and reconstructions. The observations from field researchers are analyzed in this course as one of the few elements that give tangible measurements of the corruption that occurs in post-conflict settings. Students contribute to the content of the course in several sessions and are asked to generate a model to conceptualize the notion of accountability and transparency. Both practical experiences from the field and theoretic approaches are used to structure the class. This course provides students with the opportunity to obtain experience in creating and refining policy.

Since the onset of the financial crisis in 2008, global finance was pushed to the fore of the political agenda. The course surveys the transformations underpinning the rise of global finance from the point of view of political science. The course is divided in three parts. The first part observes the historic transformations of the financial sphere. The second part addresses various characteristics of the modern financial market: the role of ideas, banking practices as well as the role of regulators and central banks. Finally, the third part looks at financial crises and regulative reforms. Topics covered include: the Gold Standard; the Bretton Woods system; deregulation and capital control; financialization and the rise of global finance; the role of economic ideas; banking practices; credit agencies; regulation and regulators ; general theory of crises; the 1998 East-Asian Financial crisis; the 2008 Global Financial crisis; post-crisis regulation; finance and society.

This course considers key themes in modern and contemporary political thought. It uses primary texts to address topics such as sovereignty, democracy, fascism, liberalism, human rights, politics and religion, violence, and political identity. Authors may include Hobbes, Spinoza, Locke, Kant, Nietzsche, Marx, J.S. Mill, Tocqueville, Rawls, Arendt, Schmitt, and Foucault.

This course provides students with a framework for understanding how political campaigns are conducted at the national and state levels in the United States. The course covers the major factors impacting elections including, the process, the rules, the media coverage, the money, outside interests, the advertising, the strategizing, the data, the field work, all within the context of the 2008 and 2016 elections. From the start of the primary season through the general election, 2016 was one of the most exciting years in American campaign history. The trajectory of the candidacy of Donald Trump defied all expectations and seemingly upended the prevailing assumptions about how to run a successful campaign. Trump's ultimate ascendancy to the presidency necessitates reexamination of many of those assumptions, but as is seen in this class, most of them continue to hold true. In each class the professor reviews that week's readings from “Campaigns and Elections”. For the first half of the semester, each class features group presentations of that week's readings from “Game Change”. For the second half of the semester, each class features group presentations of that week's readings from “The Victory Lab”.