to Content
Header Image

03: Why Democracy

-
Hauptschule
Seminar /
in englischer Sprache

The seminar investigates the rise and the transformation of democracy as a system of political rule in the 20th and 21st centuries. Why has democracy become (almost) universal? And what has democracy become in the process? Session themes include:
Democracy s first and second coming; How the meaning of democracy has changed; Democratic capitalism, postwar corporatism, the welfare state; The European Union: a democratic deficit?; Democracy in Asia and Africa; Global governance and cosmopolitan democracy; The vitality and fragility of democracy: democracy and the media, democracy and money, democracy and social capital.

READING LIST:

Session I (August 18, JD): Why democracy?
John Dunn, 2005: Setting the People Free, London: Atlantic Books, 113-118, 189-225

Session II (August 19, JD): What has democracy now become?
John Dunn, 2005: Setting the People Free, London: Atlantic Books, 119-188, 225-238
Joseph Schumpeter, 1950: Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, London: George Allen & Unwin, Chapters 20-23 (esp. 23).

Session III (August 20, WS): Democratic capitalism, neo-corporatism, the welfare state
Marshall, T.H., 1949: Citizenship and Social Class. Ch. IV in: T. H. Marshall, 1965: Class, Citizenship, and Social Development. Essays by T. H. Marshall. With an Introduction by Seymour Martin Lipset. Garden City, New York: Anchor Books, pp. 71-132
Ruggie, John Gerard, 1982: International Regimes, Transactions and Change: Embedded Liberalism in the Postwar Economic Order. International Organization, Vol. 36, 379-415
Schmitter, Philippe C., 1974: Still the Century of Corporatism? Review of Politics, Vol. 36, 85-131.

Session IV (August 21, WS): The European Union: a democratic deficit?
Follesdal, Andreas, and Simon Hix, 2005: Why There is a Democratic Deficit in the EU: A Response to Majone and Moravcsik. European Governance Papers (EUROGOV) C-05-02, Florence (http://www.connex-network.org/eruogov/pdf/egp-connec-C-05-02.pdf)
Moravcsik, Andrew, 2002: In Defense of the  Democratic Deficit : Reassessing Legitimacy in the European Union. Journal of Common Market Studies 40, 603-624.
Scharpf, Fritz W., 2003: Problem-Solving Effectiveness and Democratic Accountability in the EU. MPIfG Working Paper 03/1, Cologne (http://www.mpi-fg-koeln.mpg.de/pu/workpap/wp03-1/wp03-1.html)
Weiler, J.H.H, Ulrich R. Haltern, Franz C. Mayer, 1995: European Democracy and its Critique. West European Politics 18 (3), 4-39.

Session V (August 22, JD): Universalizing democracy: the real and the specious
Amartya Sen, 1999: Democracy as a Universal Value, Journal of Democracy, Vol. 10 (July)
Michael Bratton & Nicolas van de Walle, 1997: Democratic Experiments in Africa, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 233-279
Sunil Khilnani, 1997: The Idea of India, London: Hamish Hamilton, 15-60

University of Cambridge Chair

John DUNN

University of Cambridge

1962-1964 Graduate Student, Faculty of History, Cambridge University
1964-1965 Graduate School of Arts & Sciences, Harvard University
1965-1966 Official Fellowship in History, Jesus College, Cambridge
1966-1972 Fellow and Director of Studies in History, Kings College
1972-1977 Lecturer in Politics
1977-1987 Reader in Politics
since 1987 Professor for Political Theory, Cambridge University

Seminar-Week

show timetable