As the sequel to \textit{Political Science I} (PS 1005), this course continues to give students a guided tour in the world of political science and help them obtain a bird's-eye view of the field. Specifically, the course is further divided into the following five parts:
\begin{enumerate}
\item Comparative Politics: As a major subfield of political science, comparative politics is about understanding variations among and within modern states worldwide and their effects. Some of the variations arise from different forms of states (e.g. democracy versus dictatorship) and governments (e.g. parliamentary versus presidential systems). Others result from different social characteristics (e.g. collective versus individualistic cultures). Still others originate from different ways in which state-society relationships are maintained (e.g. developmental versus predatory states). This first part of the course will lay the foundation for the remaining topics to be explored in the class.
\item Political Economy: Located at the intersection between economics and political science, political economy as a field explores a great variety of issues arising from the interactions between economic and political arenas. First of all, this course will introduce to students the normative foundations laid by (political) economists for assessing the role politics plays in economic activities. Second, we then proceed to investigate the economic effects of political institutions with a special focus on economic policy and growth and redistribution.
\item Political Sociology: Different from political economy where distribution occupies the central stage, political sociology investigates (exogenous) social basis for politics. Starting from Robert Putnam's \textit{Making Democracy Work} (1993), political scientists have recognized the important roles played by social capital and informal institutions in politics. More recently, there has been a burgeoning literature on social networks. This part will introduce to students this important subfield.
\item Political Psychology: Along with the behavioral turn in economics, psychological factors have also attracted more attention from political scientists than ever. While individual psychologies can never fully explain macro-level politics, the former might however document the effects of the latter. This part of the course will provide students with a general introduction to political psychology and also extend to a newly established sub-field of political neuroscience.
\item Dynamics: No institutions stay forever. Through various historical cases such as the American Revolution in the 18th century, the fall of the Berlin Wall in the early 1990s, Deng Xiaoping's economic reforms kicked off in 1978, we know that economic and political institutions are certainly no exception. In this part, the course goes beyond the static analyses offered above and introduces to students two prominent issues recently: transitional justice and democratic recession.