Week 4: Readings

Week Four: Readings

India and China

This week we will explore two important "outliers" to Modernization Theory: India and China.  For different reasons, each of these cases are surprises from the perspective of theory.  In the case of India, the surprise is that a relatively poor country democratized; in the case of China, the surprise is the opposite, that a relatively wealthy country has not.  We will study some of the explanation for these anomalies.  

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Required Readings

1. Varshney, Ashutosh.  1998.  “Why Democracy Survives: India Defies the Odds.”  Journal of Democracy 9.3 (1998): 36-50.  Download Varshney, Ashutosh.  1998.  “Why Democracy Survives: India Defies the Odds.”  Journal of Democracy 9.3 (1998): 36-50. 

2. Susan V. Lawrence and Michael F. Martin.  “Understanding China’s Political System.”  Congressional Research Service Report, March 20, 2013. Download Susan V. Lawrence and Michael F. Martin.  “Understanding China’s Political System.”  Congressional Research Service Report, March 20, 2013.

3. Liu, Yu, and Dingding Chen, 2012.  “Why China Will Democratize.”  The Washington Quarterly 35, no. 1. Download Liu, Yu, and Dingding Chen, 2012.  “Why China Will Democratize.”  The Washington Quarterly 35, no. 1.

4. The Economist.  “225m reasons for China’s leaders to worry.”  July 9^th, 2016. Download The Economist.  “225m reasons for China’s leaders to worry.”  July 9th, 2016.

5. Shirk, Susan. “China in Xi’s ‘New Era’: The Return to Personalistic Rule”. Journal of Democracy 29, no. 2 (April 2018): 22-36. Links to an external site.

 

Advanced (optional):

1. Deng Xiaoping, "On the Reform of the System of Party and State Leadership," August 18, 1980, Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping (Beijing:  Foreign Languages Press, 1984), pp 302-325. Download Deng Xiaoping, "On the Reform of the System of Party and State Leadership," August 18, 1980, Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping (Beijing:  Foreign Languages Press, 1984), pp 302-325.