210150 SE M7: State Activity, Policy and Governance Analyses (2021W)

Course Description This course addresses the dynamics of political competition in European democracies. First, it concentrates on political parties as the central actors summarizing and translating individual preferences into political platforms, debated in the public sphere, and contested at the ballot boxes and on parlia mentary floors. The course addresses the historical development of political parties, it questions the bases for ideological formation, as well as the strate gies parties employ under different competitive conditions. Furthermore, the course addresses recent debates in the study of parties concerning the chang ing institutional and ideological features of party organizations. In doing this, it engages with questions about the passing or lasting role of social cleavages in political competition, the effect of value change, or the role of strategi cally calculating politicians. The course also considers the formation of voter preferences, and their subsequent vote choice. It thus connects the study of party ideology and strategy with the study of social cleavages and issue preferences among voters, drawing conclusions about the core functioning of democracy. The course presents the key theoretical approaches to the study of parties, party competition and vote choice in the form of reading discussion, lectures, debate. In addition, the course introduces some of the key approaches to the measurement and methods employed in the study of party competition, and asks students to engage in their own research based on these and other sources in the format of group and individual work.