POL 310 POLITICAL PARTIES Dr. AHERN

POL 310 is a course designed to explore the nature of interest articulation through the examination of political parties and elections in America and the world!  Interest articulation is the process through which individuals and groups make demands upon the political system.   Generally, there are a number of actors, institutions and processes that are considered to be involved in interest articulation.  The actors include interest groups and political parties.  The institutions include all levels of government and government organizations.  The processes include elections, representation/ lawmaking, administration/ implementation and evaluation.  In this course, we will concentrate on the role that political parties and elections play in this process.  There is a lot to explore!

Since this is an upper-level course, the assumption is made that students have a basic understanding of political systems and a basic understanding of the approaches which political scientists employ to study political phenomena.  It helps to be a political science major (and to have remembered ideas from POL 201 and POL 202).  Students who aren't Political Science majors should not feel intimidated taking this course. (Maybe Political Science majors should because I'll ask them to remember things from previous semesters!!!).   They should however, be willing to "catch up" by asking questions and seeking additional readings if some concepts/ ideas are unfamiliar.  This is fair since Political Science majors who take upper-level courses in other disciplines are expected to work a little harder to "catch up" as well!

We explore political parties and elections in this course through the three basic approaches to thinking that are common in the social sciences: 1) thinking theoretically; 2) thinking empirically; and  3) thinking comparatively. We do this by exploring classic works and modern analyses, looking at empirical research (and perhaps doing some of our own) and making comparisons with other countries. The comparative approach is extremely important in this class!!  The simple reason for this is American political parties and elections are (as you well know) pretty boring and unexciting.  That is not the case in other political systems/ countries.  So some of the things we'll do include:

1)  looking at different political systems;

2)  looking at different methods of election;

3)  looking at political parties outside of the United States.

You will discover that there are five "great concepts" generally employed by political  scientists to explore political phenomena.  You need to be familiar with these terms and their implications for political analysis.  The terms are: power organization culture system comparison

A note on how we learn in this course:

This course is interactive and demands active and engaged students committed to learning about the subject matter.  This course IS NOT a passive experience where you "absorb material and parrot it back on exams".  You will be forced to be an aggressive, active learner.  You will (hopefully) learn from me, but you will also have to learn on your own and learn from each other. These are both skills you will need to have when you go to graduate/law school and when you go out into the "real" world.  There will be group projects that you must participate in.  THEY ARE NOT OPTIONAL BUT REQUIRED.  If you are not comfortable with learning on your own and learning from your peers, you should not be in this class! Rapid, interactive learning means utilizing the information technology available to you at the University of Dayton.  You must also access the course webpage at least a day before each class for information/ assignments, web connections, etc. While there is no formal attendance requirement in this class, there is either a quiz on the material, a web answer sheet or something else due virtually every class period and accounting for a significant percentage of your course grade!  Materials not turned in at the end of the class are NOT accepted later (don't bother putting them in my box or saying "I forgot it.  Can I bring it later?"). I expect you to come to class prepared!   What does this all mean?  Well, in general, it means that if you "blow off" this class enough, you can't possibly pass the course!!! If the thoughts of coming to class, coming to class prepared and participating in class are not something you are interested in doing, drop now!

Texts

There are two texts for the course:

Hershey, M. R. and Beck, P.A, Party Politics in America

Flanigan, W. H. and Zingale, N. H., Political Behavior of the American Electorate

There are also numerous electronic readings in the course accessible via the on-line readings link.

Methods of Evaluation

1) quizzes, individual and group assignments (25%)

2) a mid-term examination (25%)

3) a paper (25%)

4) a final examination (25%)

Important dates

Wednesday, January 4th	Classes begin
Wednesday, January 25th	Last day to withdraw without record
Friday, March 3rd	Midterm examination
Friday, March 10th	Midterm break begins
Monday, March 20th	Classes resume
Wednesday, March 22nd	Last day to withdraw with record of W
Wednesday, April 12th	Easter break begins after last class
Tuesday, April 18th	Classes resume
Wednesday, April 26th	Last day of class
Monday, May	Final Exam