Political Analysis for Pub Pol

3 Credits · Level: Undergraduate

This is an overview of the U.S. political process and, specifically, how it creates public policy. A primary focus will be on scholars’ attempts to understand the reciprocal causal relationship between the political system and public policy. On the one hand, how does the structure and function of a political system shape the policies a country adopts? On the other hand, how do a country's past policies and general economic and social circumstances shape the political system and, thus, its future choices? While this course will primarily use U.S.-focused examples, it will, whenever possible, analyze these examples and evidence through a comparative lens—thinking about what other ways political institutions could be structured and the consequences for policy-making, drawing direct examples from other countries when appropriate. Throughout the course, we will use examples from a wide variety of liberal, conservative, and moderate policies and some policies that are hard to classify ideologically. Students should be open to learning lessons about how the political process works from both policies and political movements that they agree with and those they believe are wrong.