Varieties of Democracy and Democratization

In the wake of the Cold War, the word ‘democracy’ has begun to sound like a mantra, but what does it really mean? There is no consensus about how to conceptualize and measure it well enough to support meaningful and accurate comparisons through time and across countries. For policymakers, activists, academics, and citizens around the world, how democracy is conceptualized and measured matters. There is a large body of work in social science that deals with these issues, i.e., the nature, causes, consequences, and trajectories of democracy around the world. This course deals with the dynamics of democratization from the perspective of theoretical debates, and with analysis of historical experiences as well as with immediate policy questions. The course scrutinizes how democracy has been conceptualized, measured, even explained, and offers the opportunity to analyze comparative case studies and to provide in-depth analysis on the themes covered.