IPS558: Comparative Politics

Main reference

Clark, W.R., Golder, M. and Golder, S.N., 2024. Principles of comparative politics. CQ Press. (4th edition) | here | resource | resource2 | A Political Science Experiment | Introduction to Comparative Government and Politics An Open Education Resource Textbook

Week 1 (2/19): Introduction

Clark et al., 2024: Ch 1-3

Munck, Gerardo L. The Past and Present of Comparative Politics. In Munck, Gerardo L, and Richard Snyder. 2007. Passion, Craft, and Method in Comparative Politics. The Johns Hopkins University Press. here

Rigger, S., 2018. Studies on Taiwan’s democracy and democratisation. International Journal of Taiwan Studies, 1(1), pp.141-160. here

slide | assignment | assignment 2

Week 2 (2/26): State

2024 Nobel | Slide: science | comprartive politics | state

Clark et al., 2024: Ch 4

Tilly, Charles. 1985. War Making and State Making as Organized Crime. In Peter B. Evans,Dietrich Rueschmeyer, & Theda Skocpol (ed.) Bringing the State Back In. New York: Cambridge University Press here

Wang, Y., 2021. State-in-society 2.0: Toward fourth-generation theories of the state. Comparative Politics, 54(1), pp.175-198. here

Chu, Y.H. and Lin, J.W., 2001. Political development in 20th-century Taiwan: State-building, regime transformation and the construction of national identity. The China Quarterly, 165, pp.102-129. here

Boyd, R. and Ngo, T.-W., eds., 2006. State Making in Asia. London: Routledge.

Week 3 (3/5): Democracy

Freedom in the World 2025: The Uphill Battle to Safeguard Rights released on February 26, 2025 – 10:30AM – 11:45AM EST: February 27, 2025, from 12:30 AM to 1:45 AM in Taiwan | Freedom House on Taiwan | V-dem Graph | V-dem codebook | Varieties of Democracy Index | V-dem report on Taiwan | V-dem country coding

Clark et al., 2024: Ch 5

Templeman, K., 2022. How democratic is Taiwan? Evaluating twenty years of political change. Taiwan Journal of Democracy, 18(2), pp.1-24. here

Week 4 (3/12): 全校運動會

Week 5 (3/19): Modernization

Clark et al., 2024: Ch 6 slide

Lipset, S.M., 1959. Some social requisites of democracy: Economic development and political legitimacy. American political science review, 53(1), pp.69-105.

Treisman, D., 2020. Economic development and democracy: Predispositions and triggers. Annual Review of Political Science, 23(1), pp.241-257.

Acemoglu, D. and Robinson, J., 2022. Non-Modernization: Power–Culture Trajectories and the Dynamics of Political Institutions. Annual Review of Political Science, 25, pp.323-339. here

Slater, D. and Wong, J., 2022. From Development to Democracy: The Transformations of Modern Asia. Princeton University Press. Taiwan

Week 6 (3/26): Culture

Clark et al., 2024: Ch 7 slide

Putnam, R.D., 1992. Making democracy work: Civic traditions in modern Italy. Princeton university press. Ch 5

Collier, P. (2017) Culture, politics, and economic development, Annual Review of Political Science, 20, pp. 111–125. here

Tsai, T.H. and Tsai, C.H., forthcoming. Democratic Values and Democratic Support in Rapidly Consolidated Democracies: The Case of Taiwan, 1995–2020. Journal of Asian and African Studies, here

Week 7 (4/2): Democratization

Clark et al., 2024: Ch 8 slide

Huntington, S.P., 1991. "Democracy’s Third Wave". Journal of Democracy, 2(2), pp.12-34.

Lührmann, A. and Lindberg, S.I., 2019. A third wave of autocratization is here: what is new about it?. Democratization, 26(7), pp.1095-1113. here

Hsieh, J.F.-s. (2025) Democratization in Confucian societies, Asian Survey, 65(1), pp. 30–59. here

Week 8 (4/9): Mid-term

Week 9 (4/16): guest lecture

Week 10 (4/23): Subnational democracy in Taiwan

Taiwan counties

Vanhanen, T., 2000. A new dataset for measuring democracy, 1810-1998. Journal of peace research, 37(2), pp.251-265. here

Pérez Sandoval, J., 2023. Measuring and assessing subnational electoral democracy: A new dataset for the Americas and India. Democratization, 30(4), pp.715-740. here | data

Week 11 (4/30): Social cleavage

Clark et al., 2024: Ch 14

Lipset, S. M. and Rokkan, S. (1990). Cleavage structures, party systems, and voter alignments. In Mair, P., editor, The West European Party System, pages 99–138. Oxford University Press here

Bornschier, S., Haffert, L., Häusermann, S., Steenbergen, M., and Zollinger, D., 2024. Cleavage Formation in the 21st Century: How Social Identities Shape Voting Behavior in Contexts of Electoral Realignment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. here Ch 3

Wang, A.H.E., Yeh, Y.Y., Wu, C.K. and Chen, F.Y., 2025. Why does taiwan identity decline?. Journal of Asian and African Studies, 60(1), 115-136 here

Week 12 (5/7): Electoral rules

Clark et al., 2024: Ch 13

Norris, P., 2004. Electoral engineering: Voting rules and political behavior. Cambridge university press. NSYSU available here Ch 2

Carey, J.M. and Hix, S., 2011. The electoral sweet spot: Low‐magnitude proportional electoral systems. American Journal of Political Science, 55(2), pp.383-397. here

Su, T.C., 2024. The Effect of Constitutional Systems and Electoral Systems on the Implementation of Same-Sex Marriage: Examining Taiwan and Global Experiences. Taiwan Journal of Democracy, 20(2). here

Week 13 (5/14): Presidentialism

Clark et al., 2024: Ch 12

Linz, J.J., 1990. The perils of presidentialism. Journal of democracy, 1(1), pp.51-69. here

Cheibub, J.A. and Limongi, F. (2002) Democratic institutions and regime survival: Parliamentary and presidential democracies reconsidered, Annual Review of Political Science, 5, pp. 151–179. doi:10.1146/annurev.polisci.5.102301.084508. here

Ecevit, Y.A. and Karakoç, E., 2017. The perils of semi-presidentialism: Confidence in political institutions in contemporary democracies. International Political Science Review, 38(1), pp.4-20 here

Week 14 (5/21): Varieties of democracy and political outcomes

Clark et al., 2024: Ch 16

Lijphart, Arend. 1999. Patterns of Democracy: Government Forms and Performance in Thirty-Six Countries. New Haven: Yale University Press here 李帕特(Arend Lijphart)著 , 高德源譯. 2001[民90]. 民主類型:三十六個現代民主國家的政府類型與表現. 桂冠 Ch 10-11

Taylor, S.L., Shugart, M.S. and Lijphart, A., 2014. A different democracy. Yale University Press.

Jakala, M., Kuzu, D. and Qvortrup, M. eds., 2017. Consociationalism and power-sharing in Europe: Arend Lijphart’s theory of political accommodation. Springer.

Swiss Political Science Review, Volume 25, Issue 4: Special Issue: Half A Century of Consociationalism ‐ Cases and Comparisons

Ganghof, S., 2010. Democratic inclusiveness: A reinterpretation of Lijphart’s patterns of democracy. British Journal of Political Science, 40(3), pp.679-692.

Week 15 (5/28): Topics

Helman, G.B. and Ratner, S.R., 1992. Saving failed states. Foreign policy, (89), pp.3-20.

Robinson, J.A. and Acemoglu, D., 2012. Why nations fail: The origins of power, prosperity and poverty. London: Profile.

Johnson, S. and Acemoglu, D., 2023. Power and progress: Our thousand-year struggle over technology and prosperity. Hachette UK.