Course curriculum

  • 1

    Day 1. Why Do Democracies Break Down?

    • Introduction to the problem and concerns about the prospects for democracies around the world

    • Two rival theories of democratic breakdown

    • Perspectives from the history of political thought

    • How can we test these theories?

  • 2

    Day 2. Contemporary Scholarship on Democratic Decline

    • Operationalizing the concepts, testing the theories

    • Defining democracy and democratic breakdown

    • The fundamental problem of causal inference

    • Case study: how does the experience of Turkey under Erdogan help us to understand democratic decline?

    • How would knowing what causes democratic decline help us avoid it?

  • 3

    Day 3. Discussion Prep

    • How did the framers of the US Constitution attempt to avoid democratic decline?