Face-to-face , first term, 30 hours of theory.

First term
Monday from 10:45 to 12:45 at 119 Marais 1100

French

The course has two objectives.
By the end of the course, students should master the tools of comparative analysis and be able to critically reflect on the notions classifying these regimes, such as democracy and authoritarianism.
Secondly, students will have acquired a certain amount of basic knowledge about the concrete functioning of the political systems of different states - democratic or not -, both in its sociological and institutional aspects.

For the Bachelor in History :

For the Bachelor in Information and Communication :

For the Bachelor in Philosophy :

For the Bachelor in Political Sciences: General :

For the Bachelor in Sociology and Anthropology :

None

The comparative study of political regimes - which, following Jean-Louis Quermonne, can be defined as "the set of ideological, institutional and sociological elements that contribute to forming the government of a given country during a given period" - is at the heart of the political science approach. The characterization of political regimes certainly lied at the center of classical authors' reflections - such as Montesquieu and his De l'esprit des lois. Today, this characterization seems to become ever more complex as representative democracy imposes itself as the dominant reference for Western countries. Terms such as "populism" or "illiberal democracy" are now used in public debate to describe the mode of government of certain states without being precisely defined.
The course will introduce students to the analytical tools of political science that allow for the differentiation and classification of political regimes. In doing so, the course will address the controversies that have arisen in the classification of political regimes, from Herodotus and Aristotle to the present day. After a theoretical introduction, 6 sessions will be devoted to the study of representative democratic regimes. These will first be examined through a transversal dimension - that of voting systems and party systems -; four case studies centered on Europe and North America will then be studied in depth. The following sessions will focus on the analysis of authoritarian regimes and their internal differentiation, with a focus on the cases of China, Russia and Latin American countries. Finally, one session will be devoted to the analysis of current debates on the role of constitutional courts in democratic regimes, the rule of law and the transition from one type of regime to another.

The lecture consists of a presentation of the theoretical and empirical work on each of the topics covered. During the sessions, the presentation is based on PowerPoint-type presentations that include the structure of each session, illustrations (tables/graphs) and links to the multimedia material presented (videos, websites, etc.). The slides are available on the course website (Moodle).
Learning activities may take two different forms.
1) The lecture will be complemented by the reading of a book (TARRAGONI Federico, L'esprit démocratique du populisme, Paris, La Découverte (coll. " L'horizon des possibles "), 2019, 372 p.) available on Cairn.info.
2) Students will be asked to follow several topical issues during the semester: federal legislative elections in Germany, the presidential campaign in France and the relations between the European Union and its periphery (especially Belarus).
Both of these activities will be the subject of a review question.
Articulation between the lecture and learning activities:
The learning activities are directly linked to the lecture. The work of following up on topics in the general media is immediately linked to the theme of the course. Each topic will be introduced beforehand by the teacher during one of the course sessions. They will also be discussed with the students during the sessions.

The evaluation will take the form of a written examination.
The exam aims to verify the student's mastery of the notions and concepts studied in the course. The questions are mainly reflective and require a very good knowledge and understanding of the subject. The student could, for example, be asked to analyze and comment on a press article, an electoral result or any relevant document by mobilizing in an adequate way the concepts, theories and typologies presented in the course.
The learning activities can be either the subject of a specific question or integrated in one or several questions of the examination not exclusively dealing with the involving activities. The proportion of the assessment relating to the involving activities is +/- 25% of the final mark.

ARENDT Hannah, Les origines du totalitarisme, Paris, Éd. du Seuil (coll. « Points »), 2005.
ARON Raymond, Démocratie et totalitarisme, Paris, Gallimard (coll. « Collection Folio Essais »), 2007, 370 p.
BRACK Nathalie, DE WAELE Jean-Michel et PILET Jean-Benoît (eds.), Les démocraties européennes?: institutions, élections et partis politiques, 3e éd., Paris, Armand Colin (coll. « U »), 2015, 463 p.
COLLOMBON Maya et MATHIEU Lilian, Dynamiques des tournants autoritaires, Vulaines-sur-Seine, Editions du Croquant, 2021.
DELOYE Yves et DE WAELE Jean-Michel (eds.), Politique comparée, Bruxelles, Bruylant (coll. « Traités de science politique »), 2018.
LINZ Juan José, Régimes totalitaires et autoritaires, traduit par Mohammad-Saïd Darviche, Guy Hermet et William Genieys, Paris, A. Colin, 2006.
MARQUES-PEREIRA Bérangère, GARIBAY David, La politique en Américaine latine : Histoires, institutions et citoyennetés, Paris, Armand Colin, 2011.
MÜLLER Jan-Werner, Difficile démocratie : les idées politiques en europe au XXe siècle 1918-1989, traduit par Frédéric Joly, Paris, Alma éditeur (coll. « Essai Histoire »), 2011.
QUERMONNE Jean-Louis, Les régimes politiques occidentaux, 5e éd., Paris, Seuil (coll. « Points »), 2006.
TARRAGONI Federico, L'esprit démocratique du populisme, Paris, La Découverte (coll. « L'horizon des possibles »), 2019.*
*Compulsory