Introduction to Comparative
Politics
Political Science 204,
Spring 2008
Office Hours: Monday 1-4pm
Office: 830 PLC
Phone: 346-4128
E-mail: csmith5@uoregon.edu
SSIL -- Social Sciences Instructional Lab -- Contact Information:
(These are the folks who will administer the midterm and final exam.)
e-mail: de@ssil.uoregon.edu
Phone: 346-4642
Course Description
This course provides an introduction to major concepts and issues in comparative politics through the exploration of political institutions, political culture and policy making in nine countries. Using a comparative lens the class examines the issues of building a national identity, fostering economic growth and social development, and consolidating democracy. The class aims to provide a framework for the systematic comparison of political structures, cultures, processes and policy performance across the world’s political systems.
The course is divided into four main sections that roughly follow the layout of the textbook. Part One of the class corresponds to Part One of the textbook (Chapters 1-2), an introduction to the issues in comparative politics and an examination of why and how we compare political systems. Part Two of the class addresses systems, processes and policy (Chapters 3-7). It is in this section that a theoretical basis for examining and comparing institutions, cultures and policies is established.
The
third and fourth parts of the class examine individual countries, their
political systems, cultures and policy-making processes. Each of these chapters examines current
policy issues facing that country and its historical development. The systems, process and policy framework of
Part Two of the class is used to examine each country, highlighting its
distinctive features. Part Three of the
class examines four industrialized democracies,
*Important note: Our department offers both a lecture based and a web based Introduction to Comparative Politics course. Please double check to make certain that you are enrolled in right class and have purchased the correct book.
Your grade for the class will be based on the following (more details on each below).
In order to use the online textbook, access course materials, do the interactive simulations, and complete the class assignments you will need regular access to a competent computer with web access. You should have at least 56K dial-up Internet connection, although faster connections will obviously be better. Lack of such access is not an excuse to request alternative assignments or extensions on deadlines – it is a reason not to take this class. It is absolutely crucial that you have access to a reliable computer and Internet access for this class. Be especially careful of using wireless connections, as they can be unstable and disconnect easily.
This is an online course. It has no face-to-face meetings, unless you choose to come to my office hours. Contrary to what many anticipate, this makes the class harder, not easier. This independent study version of PS 204 is designed for self-motivated students who wish to proceed through the subject material at their own pace. Keep in mind that independent study is not the best option for every student. The lack of lectures or discussion sections means you have fewer opportunities to learn challenging material. Much of the material is challenging to understand well and there is a lot of information to absorb over the ten week quarter. I am here to help you in office hours or by email, but for the most part learning and comprehending the material is done independently. To succeed in this course, you must be motivated and well organized. Due dates are firm and frequent. They creep up fast and extensions are only given under exceptional circumstances. Your reading, studying, and analytical skills should be strong. The lack of face-to-face interactions and the fact that you are essentially learning from a textbook means you should have strong reading comprehension skills. Because so much of the course grade is based on the True/False and multiple choice quizzes and examinations, please give careful consideration to whether that is a format that will work for you. To do well in this class you should be comfortable with this method of testing. There are no alternative assignments or extra credit opportunities. Historically, the range of grades in this class has been very large – there have been large numbers of both As and Fs. The quizzes and exams are not easy. Marginal students just taking this class to avoid attending lectures and section meetings, or because they think it will be easy, are strongly encouraged to drop the class now and enroll in the traditional lecture-based version of this class – you will learn more and your grade will be higher. Be warned, I cannot emphasize enough that this course requires organization, self-motivation, strong reading comprehension and an ability to perform well in True/False and multiple choice exams. Note that PS 204 cannot be repeated for credit – the traditional lecture course PS 204 and the independent study/distance education course PS 204 are treated as the same course by the Registrar’s office.
Various elements of this class are accessible through several web sites:
E-mail Access
Important
class announcements will periodically be sent out via e-mail to your UO account. It is therefore imperative that all
students either use their UO email account, and check it several times a week,
or set it to forward to the account you really use. Please take steps
immediately to make sure that this is taken care of, and also make sure that
e-mails I send out to the class via Course Compass will make it past your spam
filter. This is your responsibility. All UO students are now
automatically assigned UO e-mail accounts, which are automatically used as your
e-mail address in all UO directories. If you do not know how to access
your UO email account, contact the Computing Center at 346-4412 to find out.
I mentioned it above, but it is worth repeating again here. You will find instructions on how to register with the Course Compass web site packaged with your textbook. You should go to the UO Political Science online portal at http://www.pearsoncustom.com/or/uo_polisci. Instructions can also be found here. Please follow the instructions carefully and be sure to complete them because mistakes can cause problems that are difficult to fix.
The required materials for this class are:
Comparative Politics Today: A World View 9/E.
Do not purchase an older version of the textbook and do not purchase Comparative Politics Today: A Theoretical Framework 5/E. The textbook and Course Compass access code are only available for purchase at the UO Bookstore in one packet. Basically, you must purchase a hardcopy of the textbook through the UO bookstore. If you are not in Eugene, you may call the bookstore and have them order the textbook and ship it directly to you. The URL for the UO Bookstore is http://uoduckstore.com/index.cfm.
Tests and Assignments
Chapter Quizzes (24% total; 1.5 points for each
chapter quiz)
Although
the book contains 19 chapters, you are only required to take chapter quizzes
for 16 of them. I have decided to omit
the chapters on Mexico (Chapter 14), India (Chapter 17), and the U.S.A.
(Chapter 19). I did this to lighten the
workload and because whole classes on politics in Mexico and the U.S.A. are
offered through the UO Political Science Department. Of course, you can read these omitted
chapters, but you will not be tested on them and they will not count toward
your grade. You will take the chapter
quizzes through the Course Compass web site.
The chapter quizzes are located under the “Chapter Quizzes” folder of
the Course Compass web site.
The
quizzes are not proctored, but they are closed book. In order to take them you
will need to promise that you are not looking things up in the book, sharing
questions or answers with classmates, printing out the quiz, or using a quiz or
quiz answers provided by a classmate. If you engage in any of these
activities even once, your grade for all the quizzes will be a zero, which
will make it essentially impossible to pass the class.
You will be given 20 minutes to take each chapter quiz. After completing the quiz, please make sure you press the submit button about 30 seconds before the 20 minute time limit because it takes the system about that long to process your quiz. You can take each quiz only once. Each quiz will consist of 11 questions, worth 10% each. This means that you can potentially score up to 110% for each quiz (a form of extra credit).
Important Deadlines: You must complete the quizzes for chapters 1-2 (Part One) by no later
than the Friday of Week 2, April 11, at 5:00 PM. Quizzes for Chapters 3-7 (Part
Two) are due the Friday of Week 5, May 2 at 5:00 PM. Chapter quizzes 8-12
(Part Three) are due Friday of Week 8, May 23 at 5:00 PM. And, finally, quizzes for Chapters 13, 15,
16, and 18 (Part Four) are due Friday of Week 10, June 6 at 5:00 PM. You
can take the quizzes at any time and get ahead in the class. Please note that the deadlines for quizzes
approach rapidly, so you may want to give serious consideration to getting
ahead least you fall behind and have to struggle to meet the deadlines. Access
to the quizzes will be password-protected after the deadlines, and will only be
available to students with approved extensions.
To get an extension you must contact me before the deadline of the quiz
for which you seek an extension.
Interactive Simulations (16% total for completion of simulations in 16 chapters, and passing short quizzes on them.)
A part of what makes this class an interactive experience
are the simulation activities available for each chapter. You will access the
simulations directly through the Course Compass web site. The actual simulations are found under each
chapter heading in the “Course Documents” section of the Course Compass web
site. In the simulation, please read the
information and watch the video. You can
also explore some of the links provided.
After completing the simulations for each of the required Chapters
(remember I have excluded Chapters 14, 17 and 19), you must take a brief
simulation quiz. The simulation quizzes are located under the “Simulation
Quizzes” folder. They are clearly marked
as “Simulation Quiz X”. When
exploring the Course Compass web site be careful not to accidentally take a
simulation or post-simulation quiz because only your first attempt will be
recorded in the gradebook. You should note that the links to the actual
simulation and to its associated quiz are located in different parts of the
Course Compass web site. The simulation
quizzes each contain five questions based on information in the
simulation. You will be given 10 minutes
to complete each simulation quiz. Simulation
quizzes for each chapter are due on the same date and at the same time as the
chapter quizzes. A list of due dates is
included in the table below.
It is recommended that you do the simulation and take the associated simulation quiz prior to taking the chapter quiz. I also recommend that you do not put them off until right before the deadline and then try to race through them. From my experience, many students do this and find that they have neither the time to do them adequately and hence perform poorly, or they miss the deadline and automatically fail the quizzes they were unable to complete. Grading on the simulation quizzes is credit/no credit (you just need to pass the quiz to get full credit). To pass a simulation quiz you need to score at least 3/5 (15/25). The questions should be easy if you pay careful attention during the simulation. If you do a simulation but still get fewer than 3 of 5 right on the quiz you can still get credit for it. I’ll will give you credit for it if you send me an e-mail with a paragraph or two (6-10 sentences) describing the simulation, what you did and why, and a few sentences linking it to concepts covered in the class. You need to do this before the deadline for that particular set of quizzes.
Blackboard Discussion Board Postings (5% total for postings on five discussion boards, credit/no credit)
You
will be responsible for posting to five Blackboard discussion boards during the
course of the term. One discussion
thread will just involve introducing yourself and the other four discussion
fora correspond to each of the four segments of the class. You must post at least once to each, all
five, of the required discussion forums.
Each of the discussion forums has a deadline, which corresponds to the
deadlines listed above for each section of the class. The deadlines are also stated in the
discussion forum title. Please make a
note of them. After the deadline you can
no longer post to the discussion forum and will receive 0 for that discussion
forum.
Your required posts must be at least one paragraph long (5-10 sentences), you must have something substantive to say, and you must somehow incorporate or refer to ideas from the readings. Do not just write a 2 sentence posting, simply restate what other students say, or post on an unrelated topic. You will not receive the one percentage point for a discussion forum if your posting is inadequate. You may of course respond on more than one topic or respond more than once on each discussion board if you like. However, you can only receive 1 point of each discussion forum no matter how many times you post to it. I encourage interaction and debate, so please feel free to engage each other through the discussion forums. You don’t have to start your own discussion thread. Making substantive responses to one another is, arguably, even better. (Hence the term discussion board!) Remember to use proper netiquette – Internet courtesy. Challenging a person’s ideas is acceptable; but insulting the person (flaming) who voiced the ideas discourages the cooperative learning process. Postings that flame another user will be removed and will not count toward the five-post minimum.
Exams (52.5%
divided into a midterm (26%) and final (29%) examination)
You will take two proctored examinations based on the assigned readings in the textbook – a midterm and final exam each worth 26% and 29% of your grade respectively. See below for detailed instructions for taking these exams. Exams are made up of multiple choice and/or true/false questions. The midterm will cover Parts One and Two of the textbook (Chapters 1-7) and the final will cover Part Three of the textbook (Chapters 8-18, excluding Chapter 14, 17 and 18). The final examination is not cumulative. Tests are closed-book and cannot be taken more than once. The SSIL lab does not allow students to use electronic dictionaries in the exam, so if you need a dictionary please make sure you have a hardcopy substitute. Both exams will be in the SSIL system at all times, so take extra care when logging in that you are logging in for the correct exam! If you take the wrong exam there is literally nothing anyone can do to “fix” it.
The exams cover a wide range of material and require knowledge of broad concepts and specific factual details. They require you to have a firm grasp of the information covered in the textbook.
The
deadline for taking the midterm is Saturday of Week 6, May 10. The
deadline for taking the Final exam is Thursday of Finals Week, June 12. No extensions will be granted for the midterm
or final.
Quiz (including post-simulation activity quizzes) and exam deadlines:
|
Text Section |
Text Chapter |
Quiz and Discussion Forum Deadline |
Exam Deadline |
|
1: Introduction |
Chapters
1-2 |
April 11 |
|
|
2: System,
Processes and Policy |
Chapters
3-7 |
May 2 |
MidtermMay 10 |
|
3: Country
Studies: Advanced Industrialized Democracies and Russia |
Chapters
8-12 |
May 23 |
|
|
4: Country
Studies: The Developing World |
Chapters
13, 15, 16, and 18 |
June 6 |
FinalJune 12 |
Examination Policies and
Procedures:
Exam testing policies can be viewed on-line at http://distanceeducation.uoregon.edu/information/on_campus and http://distanceeducation.uoregon.edu/information/off_campus. It is each student’s responsibility to understand and follow the policies outlined in this document. If you have any further questions, please contact me.
Test Scheduling and Deadlines: You may schedule an exam for any available time (available test times will be determined by SSIL or your approved remote proctor), up to the deadlines – Saturday, May 10 (week 6) for the midterm and Thursday, June 12 (Finals Week) for the final, up until SSIL’s last time slot that day. It is your responsibility to make sure that you take the exam before the deadline. I will not grant extensions for the taking the midterm or final for any reason. I strongly recommend making an appointment as early as you can, and taking the exams at least a day or two before the deadlines in case something comes up at the last minute. The time slots in the SSIL lab fill up quickly, so if you have a busy schedule or are only in Eugene a few days a week please make sure you book a time slot early. You will take the chapter quizzes on your own through Course Compass – you do not need to make appointments for them. Please recall that quiz deadlines are different than the exam deadlines.
On-Campus Students: If you are taking this course on campus, you will take all your tests at the Social Science Instructional Lab (SSIL) located in McKenzie Hall 445. All on-campus tests are given and scheduled by appointment only. Before you can schedule an exam, you must complete the On-Line Introduction to Test taking by going to: http://distanceeducation.uoregon.edu/ and clicking anywhere on the paragraph that begins “be sure to get your Test Taker ID.” After you complete the introduction, you will be given a Test Taker ID Number and Password. Please write these down in a safe place and remember them. With these, you can log into your Test Taker Home Page from the above distance education web page. From your Test Taker Home Page you can make appointments to take tests, cancel appointments, see your test scores, e-mail your professor, change your test taker password, and more. You should go through the On-Line introduction the first week of class. Take the time to read the information under the link, “On Campus Students.” If you have further questions about testing, contact: de@ssil.uoregon.edu.
It is strongly recommended that students make appointments in SSIL for taking tests early. You cannot, however, make appointments more than two weeks in advance of your intended test date (not the test deadline). If you want to take tests early you may do so. Remember that SSIL has limited testing slots available each day so make certain that you plan ahead.
Be sure to schedule yourself enough time to finish a test. This is not usually a problem. In fact, from my experience students take far less time than they should in the midterm and final. Budget extra time for possible software or other complications. Thirty minutes is the average time needed to complete the exams, and appointments are for one hour. The lab fee for this class also entitles you to use the computers in SSIL for word processing, web browsing, etc. Absolutely no food or drink allowed is in the lab. For more information, check the SSIL Web page at: http://ssil.uoregon.edu/.
To ensure that SSIL test times are available for all student schedules, a wide variety of test-taking times are available. They will be posted at http://distanceeducation.uoregon.edu/. If your schedule is inflexible it is your responsibility to sign up far enough in advance to get a space in a time slot that fits your schedule. It is not SSIL’s or the instructor’s responsibility to make an additional exam time for you. More slots are likely to be added during the term as the level of demand becomes clear.
Remote Site Testing (other than Eugene) – Off-Campus Students: If you are taking this course off-campus, go to the web site: http://distanceeducation.uoregon.edu/ and click on the “Off Campus Students” tab at the top of the page. Read all the information on the page. Before you can take a test, you must obtain a proctor and have the proctor approved by SSIL. You must do this before the end of the second week of classes. The web page describes how to do this. Once you have found a proctor, fill out the remote site request form on the web page. SSIL will notify you if the proctor you have chosen is approved. If you have further questions, contact de@ssil.uoregon.edu .
All visits to the proctored test sites must be scheduled in advance. You can get all necessary information about your testing site by contacting the testing site proctor or the Continuation Center's Distance Education Program. All Beaverton test-takers should go to http://de.uoregon.edu/proctoring/exam-ps.php#Portland for specific instructions.
For security reasons, the following class policies will be strictly enforced at both the Eugene Campus SSIL testing center and the remote site testing centers. Students at the remote sites should be aware that each remote site may have additional policies.
Do not hesitate to ask the person
administering the test for help with the testing software. If you experience
any problems with the software, notify the person administering the test
immediately. The person administering the test will help you restart the software
and contact the professor about the problem.
For questions concerning administration and scheduling of exams, contact the SSIL lab first; for questions regarding quiz or exam content, simulations, discussion forum postings, or grading, contact Professor Clint Smith.
Online Gradebook Information
The CourseCompass online gradebook will house all your earned grades for the quarter. Do not check the University of Oregon Blackboard page for grades, as you will not see any. CourseCompass automatically updates your grades after you complete a quiz or a simulation. You need to be very careful while taking the quizzes. If you see an “!” where your score should be, it means you went overtime while completing the assignment. Remember you need to press the “submit” button about 30 seconds before the 20 minute time limit. Usually this is not a big deal unless it is an egregious amount of time (more than a minute or two). Please send me an email if you see one of these and I will fix the problem, usually by manually grading your quiz and entering your score. If you see an icon that looks like a combination lock, it means that an error occurred while you were taking the quiz. Usually it means that you lost your Internet connection, accidentally closed the browser window, or some other technical error occurred. If you see one of these please send me an email and I will correct the problem, usually by clearing your first attempt and letting you try again. However, for this error I can only clear one attempt per user per term. Discussion board, midterm, and final exam scores are updated after the deadline for their completion.
Final grades are calculated based on your percentages on the 16 chapter quizzes at 1.5% each, completion of the 16 simulation quizzes at 1% each (credit/no credit), the 5 required Blackboard discussion postings at 1% each (credit/no credit) and the midterm and final exams each at 26 and 29% each respectively. The grades in the class Course Compass page will be updated only twice – after the midterm and then again after the final.
If necessary, I reserve the right to apply a curve at a level that I deem appropriate. While a curve is a possibility, you should not count on it; rather, you should assume that your grade will be based on your raw scores and the cutoffs below. If I do use a curve, no one will receive a grade below where the raw scores would have placed you; but depending where you are in relation to the cutoffs, it is possible that some students’ letter grades would increase while others would not, or that some students’ letter grades would increase more than others. If a student is on the border of two grades I will take into account the effort they into the class when assigning a grade.
Cutoffs for letter grades are as follows:
|
|
Minus |
Plain |
Plus |
|
A |
90-93.33 |
93.34-96.66 |
96.67
+ |
|
B |
80-83.33 |
83.34-86.66 |
86.67-89.99 |
|
C |
70-73.33 |
73.34-76.66 |
76.67-79.99 |
|
D |
60-63.33 |
63.34-66.66 |
66.67-69.99 |
|
F |
|
0-59.99 |
|