European Politics in Comparative Perspective

3 Credits.

Despite the periodic resurgence of war on its periphery, Europe can easily appear as a pacified and relatively boring continent. This course will question this stereotype through an examination of European politics in historical and cross-national perspective. We will discuss central concepts that comparative politics scholars mobilize in the study of European politics across time and space. Topics will include: political, legal, and economic governance; the evolution of democracy, the welfare state, partisan politics, citizenship, and identities; European integration and globalization.