POLITICAL SCIENCE 100C PROFESSOR
AMERICAN POLITICAL PARTIES OFFICE:
390 SSB
WINTER 2002 OFFICE HOURS: W&Th
gcox@weber.ucsd.edu
(Tu&Th
11:10-12:30, Solis 104)
GENERAL INFORMATION
All readings should be
completed by the date indicated; lectures will be based on the assumption that
they have been.
A midterm (worth 40% of the
final grade) and a final examination (worth 60%) will be given. The final examination will be given at the
time officially designated. NO EXCEPTIONS without my prior consent! Similarly, if you miss the midterm, and have
not notified me ahead of time that
you will miss it, expect no mercy, even if the reason for missing it would have
been acceptable if given beforehand.
Both the midterm and the final exam will be closed book and notes.
The following books will be
used extensively and are available for purchase at the bookstore:
Beck and Hershey, Party
Politics in America (9th edition)
Riordan, Plunkitt
of Tammany Hall
Royko, Boss
Rohde, Parties and
Leaders in the Postreform House
ASSIGNMENTS
I. Introduction
Jan 8: Beck and Hershey, ch. 1
Democracy as partisan competition for
office in free & universal elections.
Defining parties.
II. Party
Organization, Machine-Style
Jan 10&15: Riordan,
entire; Beck and Hershey, ch. 3.
Classifying parties.
Defining private, public, and common
goods.
Plunkitt (New York).
Jan 17&22: Royko, entire
The Progressive attack on parties.
The twentieth-century machine and the
growth of government.
Daley (Chicago).
III. Parties
as Electoral Strategists
Jan 24&29: Beck
and Hershey, ch. 2.
Centrist parties.
The Downsian spatial model of electoral
competition.
Duverger's law.
Electoral systems and party adaptations
thereto.
Jan 31&Feb 5: Beck
and Hershey, chs. 9,12.
The politics of nomination.
Campaign finance.
*******Feb 7: IN-CLASS
MIDTERM EXAMINATION**********
Feb 12&14: Beck
and Hershey, chs. 10-11
The politics of nominating and electing
a President.
IV. Parties
and Voters
Feb 19: Beck and
Hershey, Part III
Mobilization, persuasion and
coordination.
Mobilization:
Naturalization, Suffrage, Registration, and Turnout.
Persuasion:
Agenda setting and position-taking.
Coordination:
The wasted vote argument.
Theories of party loyalty and
identification.
V. The Parties in Government
Feb 21&26: Beck
and Hershey, chs. 13 & 15;
Rohde, ch. 1.
The determinants of legislative
cohesion; the budgets of '90, '93 and '95.
The internal structure of the House of
Representatives.
Feb 28&Mar5:
Rohde, chs 2-6.
Mar 7&12: No reading assigned.
Recent elections.
VI.
Conclusions
Mar 14: Beck and Hershey , Part VI