WESTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY

DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL SCIENCE

CAPITALISM AND DEMOCRACY

Political Science 4500 (Fall 2011) T/TH 12:30-1:45pm

Brown 4037

Instructor:

Dr. Lambert

Office hours: Monday 1:30-3pm, Tuesday 1:45-3pm and by appointment

Friedman Hall Rm. 3410

Telephone: 387-5693

e-mail: priscilla.lambert@wmich.edu

webpage: http://homepages.wmich.edu/~plambert/

Course description: The purpose of this course is to provide a general introduction to the field of comparative political economy and an in-depth introduction to the political economy of democratic capitalism. This course will begin by examining the economic principles of and justifications for the self-regulating market as well as critiques of capitalism and rationalizations for intervention and regulation of free market economies. As we shall see, democracy and capitalism tend to go hand in hand, but there is a great deal of variation in how much democratic governments are willing to intervene into free markets. We will examine the similarities and differences across advanced democracies and compare how much democracies shape economic outcomes, as well as the degree to which markets and economic factors shape democratic institutions and processes. Finally, we will focus on the welfare state which plays a critical role in maintaining stability in democratic and capitalist systems. This course fulfills the requirement for baccalaureate writing proficiency.

Required texts.

Course readings are all available on e-reserve. Go to the e-reserve webpage and create an account if you don’t have one and follow the links to our course page: http://www.wmich.edu/library/reserves/. You will need a password that I will give out in class.

Course requirements and grading:

Assignments and participation. This seminar is the capstone course for the political science major and expectations for student participation in seminar and for writing assignments are high. Participation in seminar is a large portion of the course grade. Students are expected to complete all reading assignments before coming to class and to actively participate in seminar discussions every class. Students must bring a copy of the assigned reading to each class. In addition, students will make one major presentation to the class on a topic of their choice (with professor’s approval). This course also has a large writing component and students will submit 5 writing assignments of varying length with opportunities to edit and revise your work: papers #1 and #4 will be peer reviewed, and paper #5 will be a revised and expanded version of paper #4.

Resident experts. In addition to coming prepared for class and presenting your long paper to class, students will be responsible for class discussion on a rotating basis. In each seminar 1-2 students will be the resident expert. Their responsibilities are to prepare discussion questions, help lead discussion and help clarify any questions about that day’s reading.

Attendance policy. After two absences, the attendance portion of your grade will begin to suffer (no exceptions).

Late paper policy: Generally speaking, papers will be due on Fridays at noon (see schedule below). There is a 5 point grade deduction per day for late papers.

Grading. Course grades will be calculated according to the following formula:

Participation 30%

Paper 1 10%

Paper 2 10%

Paper 3 10%

Paper 4 10%

Paper 5 20%

Class presentation 10%

Grading scale:

A = 93-100 B = 83-87 C = 73-77 D = 60-67

BA = 88-92 CB = 78-82 DC = 68-72 E = 0-59

Academic Integrity:

Plagiarism is wrong and will not be tolerated. If you have doubts about what constitutes plagiarism, consult the policies and procedures for Student Academic Conduct in the Undergraduate and Graduate catalogs (available at www.wmich.edu/catalog under “Academic Politics, Student Rights and Responsibilities”) and/or talk to me. These policies include cheating, fabrication, falsification and forgery, multiple submission, plagiarism, and computer misuse. If there is reason to believe that a student has been involved in academic dishonesty, I will report the student to the Office of Student Conduct and the student will receive an F for the assignment and possibly for the course.

WMU Turnitin Supplementary Syllabus Statement:

Students who take this class must be prepared to submit electronic copies of some or all assignments. The University expects that all students will be evaluated and graded on their own work. If you use language, data, or ideas from other sources, published or unpublished, you must take care to acknowledge and properly cite those sources. Failure to do so may constitute plagiarism or other violation of University academic honesty policies (refer to the Undergraduate or Graduate catalogs for details). To detect and deter plagiarism, encourage responsible student behavior, improve student learning, and ensure greater accountability, assignments for this class may be submitted for textual similarity review to Turnitin.com and/or other resource. Use of the Turnitin.com service is subject to the Terms and Conditions of Use posted on the Turnitin.com website. Papers that are submitted to Turnitin.com become part of the Turnitin.com database (student identities are protected) solely for the purpose of detecting plagiarism of such papers. Use of the Turnitin.com service is subject to the Terms and Conditions of Use posted on the Turnitin.com site. Students agree that by taking this course all required papers may be subject to submission for textual similarity review to Turnitin.com for the detection of plagiarism. All submitted papers will be included as source documents in the Turnitin.com reference database solely for the purpose of detecting plagiarism of such papers. Use of the Turnitin.com service is subject to the Terms and Conditions of Use posted on the Turnitin.com site. If you wish to request that your paper(s) not be included in the Turnitin.com reference database, I need to receive your request in writing prior to submission of any course assignments; the paper(s) can then be processed and reviewed accordingly. The results of a Turnitin.com originality report or other resources may be used as evidence to charge you with plagiarism or other offense. If that is the case, you will be given the opportunity to respond per the regular institutional process and procedures that govern student academic conduct (http://osc.wmich.edu/academicintegrity/).

Course schedule: Syllabus and assigned readings subject to change.

Week 1

Tuesday (9/6): Introduction and course overview

Thursday (9/8): Definitions and measures

• Philippe Schmitter and Terry Karl, “What Democracy Is…and Is Not.” Journal of Democracy 2 (Summer 1991): 75-88.
• Measures of democracy: Freedom House Scores for political and civil liberties available at: http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=594

• Measures of capitalism: Economic Freedom of the World Report. Available at: http://www.heritage.org/Index/Ranking

PART I: FOUNDATIONS

Week 2: Classical economics

Tuesday (9/13)

• Adam Smith. The Wealth of Nations. Book I, Ch 1-3; Book IV, Ch 2.
• Levine, David. Wealth and Freedom. Ch. 3, “Capitalism.”

Thursday (9/15)

• Milton Friedman. Capitalism and Freedom. Pp. 1-6, 22-36, and 196-202.
• Levine, David. Wealth and Freedom. Ch. 4, “The Self-regulating Market.”

Recommended:

Caporaso, James and David Levine. Theories of Political Economy. Chapter on the

classical approach (pp. 33-54).

Heilbroner, Robert. The World Philosophers. Ch 1-2, “The Economic Revolution” and

“The Wonderful World of Adam Smith.”

Week 3: The limits of the market

Tuesday (9/20)

• Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. The Communist Manifesto. (Chapters 1, 2, and 4)

Thursday (9/22)

• Polanyi, Karl. The Great Transformation. pp. 33-76. (especially ch 3 & 6, skim ch.4-5), pp. 135-62. (esp. ch.12)

Recommended:

Heilbroner, Robert. The World Philosophers.“The Inexorable System of Karl Marx.” pp.

42-75, 136-171).

Caporaso, James and David Levine. Theories of Political Economy. Chapter on Marxian

political economy, pp. 55-78.

***Paper #1 due***

Week 4: “Can capitalism survive?”

Tuesday (9/27)

• Lekachman, Robert. 1966. The Age of Keynes. Ch 3, “The Road to The General Theory” (skim) and Ch. 4, “The General Theory.”

Thursday (9/29)

• Schumpeter, Joseph A. 1942. Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy. Part II: Can Capitalism Survive? Prologue (pp. 61-2), Ch. 7, “The Process of Creative Destruction,” Ch 12, “Crumbling Walls;” Part III: Can Socialism Work? Ch. 16, “The Socialist Blueprint.”

Recommended:

Caporaso and Levine. Theories of Political Economy. Ch. 5: “Keynesian Political

Economy.”

Hansen, Bent. “Unemployment, Keynes, and the Stockholm School.” History of Political

Economy. 13. (Summer 1981): 256-77

PART II: EFFECT OF CAPITALISM ON DEMOCRACY

Week 5: Democracy and development

Tuesday (10/4)

• Przeworski and Limongi. 1997. “Modernization: Theories and Facts.” World Politics. 49 (2): 155-183.

Thursday (10/6)

• Boix, Carles. 2003. Democracy and Redistribution. “Introduction” and Ch. 3 “Historical Evidence” pp. 1-18, 110-129.

Recommended:

Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens. Capitalist Development and Democracy. Pp. 5-

11, 40-69, skim pp. 75-89.

Week 6: Privileged Position of Capital?

Tuesday (10/11)

• Lindblom, Politics and Markets. Ch. 13 “Privileged Position of Business” (pp. 170-188) and Ch. 14 “Consequences for Polyarchy.”

Thursday (10/13)

• Bernhagen, Patrick and Thomas Brauninger. 2005. “Structural Power and Public Policy: A Signaling Model of Business Lobbying in Democratic Capitalism.” Political Studies. Vol. 53, Iss. 1 (March): 43-64.

Recommended:

Mares, Isabella. 2003. “The Sources of Business Interest in Social Insurance: Sectoral

versus National Difference.” World Politics. Vol. 55, No. 2 (January): 229-259.

Martin, Cathie-Jo and Duane Swank. 2004. “Does the Organization of Capital Matter?”

American Political Science Review. Vol. 98, No, 4 (November): 593-611.

***Paper #2 due***

Week 7: Politics and Economic Crisis

Tuesday (10/27)

· John Cassidy, “Rational Irrationality.” The New Yorker, October 5, 2009.

· Kindleberger, Charles. 1996. Manias, Panics and Crashes. Ch.3 “Speculative Manias.” (pp. 20-43).

Thursday (10/29)

· Friedman’s take on economic crisis: John Lippet, “Friedman Would Be Roiled as Chicago Disciples Rue Repudiation” (Bloomberg Press) and Michael Fitzgerald, “Chicago Schooled: The Visible Hand of the Recession Has Revitalized Critics of the Chicago School of Economics” (University of Chicago Magazine)

· Reich, Robert. 2007. “How Capitalism is Killing Democracy.” Foreign Policy. (Sept/Oct): 38-42.

PART III: EFFECT OF DEMOCRACY ON CAPITALISM

Week 8: Democratic Institutions and Economic Outcomes

Tuesday (10/25)

• Olson, Mancur. 1982. The Rise and Decline of Nations. Ch. 3, “The Implications” and part of Ch. 4 “The Developed Democracies” (pp. 36-98).

Thursday (10/27)

• Lijphart, Arend. 1999. Patterns of Democracy. Ch. 1 & 15 (pp. 1-8, 258-74)
• Steinmo, Sven. 1989. “Political Institutions and Tax Policy in the US, Sweden and Britain.” World Politics. V. 41, No. 4 (July): 500-535.

***Annotated bibliography due***

Recommended reading:

Ellen Immergut. 1990. “Institutions, Veto Points, and Policy Results: A Comparative

Analysis of Health Care.” Journal of Public Policy. 10 (4): 391-416.

Adam Przeworski et al. 2000. Democracy and Development: Political Institutions and

Material Well-being in the World 1950-1990. Cambridge University Press.

Week 9: Institutions and Economic Trade-offs

Tuesday (11/1)

• Lange, Peter and Geoffrey Garrett. 1985. “The Politics of Growth.” Journal of Politics.47(3): 792-827.
• Torben Iversen and Anne Wren. 1998. “Equality, Employment and Budgetary Restraint: The Trilemma of the Service Economy.” World Politics. 50(4): 507-546.

Thursday (11/3): Varieties of Capitalism

· Estevez-Abe, Margarita, Torben Iversen, and David Soskice, “Social Protection and the Formation of Skills: A Reinterpretation of the Welfare State.” In Varieties of Capitalism.

Recommended:

Hall, Peter and David Soskice, eds. 2001. Varieties of Capitalism. Ch. 1, 4, and 7.

Hall, Peter. “Political Economy of Europe” in Continuity and Change in Contemporary

Capitalism.

Soskice, David. “Divergent Production Regimes” in Continuity and Change in Contemporary Capitalism.

***Paper #3 due***

PART IV: THE WELFARE STATE

Week 10

Tuesday (11/8): Distribution and Inequality

• Smeeding, Timothy. “Poor People in Rich Nations: The US in Comparative Perspective.” Jan. 2006.

· Alesina, Glaeser, and Sacerdote. 2005. “Work and Leisure in the US and Europe: Why So Different?” NBER Working Paper, #11278. (Skim)

Thursday (11/10): Politics of the Welfare State

· Evelyne Huber, Charles Ragin, and John Stephens. 1993. “Social Democracy, Christian Democracy, Constitutional Structure, and the Welfare State.” American Journal of Sociology. 99:711-49.

Recommended:

Atkinson, Anthony, Rainwater, Lee, and Timothy Smeeding. 1995. Income Distribution

in OECD Countries: Evidence from the Luxembourg Income Study. Paris:

Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Bradley, David, Evelyne Huber, Stephanie Moller, Francois Nielson, and John Stephens.

2003. “Distribution and Redistribution in Postindustrial Democracies.” World

Politics. Vol. 55, No. 2 (January): 193-228.

Esping-Andersen. 1990. The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism. Ch. 2,

“Decommodification in Social Policy” and ch.3, “Welfare State as System of

Stratification.”

Week 11

Tuesday (11/15)

· Catch up + peer review; no reading assignment

· Draft of paper #4 due in class

Thursday (11/17)

· Pierson, Paul. 1996. “The New Politics of the Welfare State.” World Politics. 48 (143-79).

***Paper #4 due***

Week 12

Tuesday (11/22)

· In-class debate

Thursday (11/24): Thanksgiving Day R&R

Week 13

Tuesday (11/29): Gender and the welfare state

· Barbara Hobson, “No Voice, No Exit: Women's Economic Dependency and the Welfare State.” Acta Sociologica. 33: 235-50.

· Gornick, Janet and Marcia Meyers. 2003. Families That Work. Ch.3, “The United States in Cross-National Perspective.”

Recommended:

Anna Shola Orloff. 1993. “Gender and the Social Rights of Citizenship: The Comparative

Analysis of Gender Relations and Welfare States.” American Sociological Review.

58: 303-328.

Gauthier, Anne. 1996. The State and the Family: A Comparative Analysis of Family

Policies in Industrialized Nations. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Gornick, Janet and Marcia Meyers. 2003. Families That Work. Ch.8, “Does Policy

Matter? Linking Policies to Outcomes.”

Huber, Evelyne and John Stephens. 2000. “Partisan Governance, Women's Employment,

and the Social Democratic Service State.” American Sociological Review. 65

(June): 323-42.

Thursday (12/1): Student Presentations

Week 14

Tuesday (12/6): Student Presentations

Thursday (12/8): Student Presentations

***Paper #5 due during final exam week***