Political Behaviour: Reason, Passion, Biology

3 credits · Undergraduate

Political behavior is the study of the private roots of public action. To understand how and why people act politically, we delve into psychology, family life, sexuality, and genetics. In addition to these individual characteristics, the economy, geography, and class drive the political behaviour of individuals and organized groups. Topics include: public opinion, political polarization, culture wars, elections, modernization theory, populism, democratization, and the resource curse. The final unit considers big data and commercial applications of social science research in political practice. Although this material is comparative, we principally want to investigate how it applies to Canada. CROSSLISTED: POLI 5242.03 FORMATS: Seminar