Due Dates for Democratization Course

All Democratization Course Students--

Please be aware of the following due dates:
1.) By this coming Monday, December 4, every student needs to hand in a typed, 1 page report describing all the work they did on each of the group presentations. This paper is essential for grading the projects. NO LATE PAPERS WILL BE ACCEPTED!
2.) The term paper that develops one country, analyzing all aspects of democratization for that country, is due by Friday, December 8, at 1pm.
3.) The final exam will be take-home and will be handed out in class next week. Your typed, double-spaced, normal font responses are due by the Final Exam data, which is Tuesday, December 12, 2006, at 11:30am.

Due Dates for International Conflict Course

International Conflict Class--

Please be aware of the following:

1.) The due date for Project #2 is December 8, 2006, but I will accept the project up until 4pm, December 11, 2006, without penalty.
2.) The take-home final will be handed out in class at some point during the next two weeks. Your typed, double-spaced, normal font responses are due by the time of the final exam for this course, which is Friday, December 15, at 11:30am.

Background Readings...

...for my lectures during the last two weeks of classes can be found here, here, and here. Enjoy!

Territorial Threat and International Alliances

Here are the notes for today's class.

Group Presentations -- Fourth Week

Here are the presentation slides for this week:

Group A: Latvia and Lithuania
Group B: Belarus and Ukraine
Group C: Bulgaria and Romania
Group D: Greece and Turkey

GINI coefficient

Here is a link to a nice explanation of the Gini coefficient measuring income (and potentially asset) inequality. Note the list of countries at the bottom.

Territorial Threat, State Development and Implications from the Theory

Here are today's class notes.

Foreign Terrorist Organization List

Conflict Class Members-

Here is a list of foreign terrorist organizations as labeled by the US State Department. I have highlighted, in yellow, the organizations that could possibly be related to one of the arms races in your set of cases. If you have an arms race that is post-1945, be sure to check this list and examine ANY linkages between the arms race and the terrorist organization. ANY linkage could mean formation, funding once it began, or a whole host of other connections. If your countries or your time periods overlap the terrorist group, make sure you investigate the group fully.

UPDATE: Here is a list of insurgency groups for every country. I have no idea if this list is exhaustive, so there may be insurgencies in your countries that are not listed here. So, at the very least, be sure to investigate these insurgencies to determine if your arms races started or provided funding for these groups.

Insurgency Funding

We've talked many times about the role insurgencies play, both as a hindrance to democratization and as a means of toppling the state. Here is an interesting New York Times story that discusses a recent US report on insurgency financing in Iraq. The report looks grim.

Group Presentations -- Third Week

Here are the presentations for Week 3:

Group A: Taiwan and South Korea

Group B: China and Japan

Group C: Myanmar and Vietnam

Group D: Sri Lanka and India

Project #2

Here is a description of Project #2. It's due December 8, 2006.

Group Presentations -- Second Week

I hope everyone remembers that we have only limited time for each group presentation -- 10 to 12 minutes maximum to ensure that each group presents. I'll strictly enforce that 12 minute maximum, so be sure to only hit the highlights of your research.

Here are the presentations--
Group A -- Libya and Algeria
Group B -- Burkina Faso and Ghana
Group C -- Nigeria and Sao Tome and Principe
Group D -- Gabon and Congo

Take a look at this...

Here is an opinion piece by an economist at Harvard discussing how that university should organize its curriculum. It's interesting and applies well to how our classes have progressed. One of the best paragraphs is this one:

"Harvard’s system of general education should emphasize methodology over topic because methods are harder to teach and learn than facts. Facts become easier to absorb by one’s self once one has a handle on methods. Harvard students can learn facts about the United Nations Security Council or the Federal Reserve Board from the New York Times or Wikipedia, but they cannot learn the tools to make sense of these institutions so readily. As students learn to think rigorously about society and how to use data to test their thoughts, they acquire a set of tools that can then be used to acquire knowledge in any setting."

Contagion

Here is a short slide on contagion effects in conflict. The probabilities come from Yamamoto and Bremer (1980).

Presentations Update

Hi Everyone, Nice job on the first set of presentations -- we're off to a good start. On the second and future presentations, you may want to take a look at these websites (here and here) which offers several tips for PowerPoint presentations. The main advice I have is twofold: 1) Don't read your presentation, and 2) focus on the variables that are important for this class. On the latter, make sure every single piece of information you put on the presentation somehow relates to the role of democratization in that country.


Scheduling:
The second set of presentations will be this Friday, 11/17/06. Please make sure to email me your presentations by 5pm on Thursday. Also, please have both countries on the same presentation and title the file with a short (8 letter) descriptive name.

The third set of presentations will be next Monday, 11/20. Please email me the slides by 5pm Sunday.

Group Presentations -- First Week

I hope everyone realizes that we have only limited time for each group presentation -- 10 to 12 minutes maximum to ensure that each group presents. I'll strictly enforce that 12 minute maximum, so be sure to only hit the highlights of your research.

Here are the presentations--
Group A -- Mexico and Cuba
Group B -- Costa Rica and Guatemala

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Group C -- Colombia and Peru
Group D -- Argentina and Chile

Togo -- An example for the class presentations

Click here to see an example presentation for the class projects.

Inside-out or outside-in

Here are today's class notes.

Final thoughts on crises

Here are today's notes for class.