PS 215: COMPARATIVE POLITICS: DEVELOPING NATIONS
Study Guide for Test 1 (preliminary)
 

Rural society (Good Earth) -- Traditional society:
    patterns of land ownership
    risk, causes of famine
    strategy for dealing with famine
    status of women
    culture/educational levels/views of nature and science
    conditions for successful collective action -- eg. dealing with locusts
    role of government
    Charles Taylor, Big Man, warlord

What's in a name? What are the implications of these various words
     Developing Nations. Third World. Fourth World. South.  LDC.
     state. nation. ethnic group
 

Kenya history/culture
    Mau Mau
    circumcision
    Leaders (Kenyatta, Moi)
    pyramid of violence
    "It is our turn to eat"

Max Weber:

 Modernity. traditional system. charismatic leadership. patrimonial  system.  patron client system.   clientalism, Transparency International,
demographic transition, trachoma, schistosomiasis
Imperialism:
     Berlin Congress (1885). direct/indirect rule.
     Which countries were, and were not colonized?  "genetic integration."  artificial state. failed state
      Fracophonic, Anglophonic, Negritude,  Franz Fanon, Triple heritage

commodity, scissors, debt trap, terms of trade
moral economy, peasant "rationality", parcelization, polarization  kulak
land reform-Taiwan
Wolf Ladejinsky
Integrated Rural Development (IRD)
collective agriculture, basic needs, green revolution, red revolution, white revolution, blue revolution
opium/coca as an export crop
Punjab, Kerala
Import substituting industrialization, export oriented industrialization, sweat shop, relative/absolute poverty
WTO, cartel, Four Dragons, MNC,

Structural Adjustment, IMF, World Bank, conditionality, privatization, devaluation, neo-liberalism, IMF riot.

moral economy, peasant "rationality", parcelization, polarization  kulak
latifundia, minifundia,
urban bias, parastatals
squatter settlements

urban pull, rural push, urban bias, ecological limits

Essays:

1. What are the structural characteristics of "traditional" societies?

2. What are the distinctive elements of "modern" societies?

3. What have been the long term impacts of colonialism in third world countries?

4. Is the transition from "traditional" society to "modern" society a simple process?  What are the types of problems that are likely to occur? What are the political consequences of these problems?

5. Define the concept of artifical state and explain its significance.

6. Discuss the first film we saw (dealing with family relations in Africa) and Koigi's discussion of his childhood in terms of Max Weber's ideas of "traditional society."

7. The Mau Mau uprising was described both by Koigi and one of the Ali Mazrui films on Africa.  Think about the military and human resources available to the Mau Mau and to the British.  Think about the casulties on both sides.  Who won?  Why?

8. Discuss traditional methods of coping with the risk and reality of famine, as illustrated in The Good Earth.

9. Discuss traditional social structure in the countryside as illustrated in The Good Earth.

10. What are the various forms of agrarian reforms?

11. Why is there so much migration from rural to urban areas?

STOP HERE
 
 
 
 

6. Why might religion decline in importance as third world countries modernize?  Why might religion increase in importance as third world countries modernize?  In practice, what seems to be happening?

7. How have various religions (Christianity, Islam, Buddhism) been involved with national politics?

8. What factors seem to trigger ethnic violence?  What factors (or institutional arrangements)  seem to ameliorate ethnic tensions?

9. Review the ethnic tensions of Sri Lanka, Nigeria, and Rwanda.  What political patterns seems common in all three cases?

10. What is the experience with the use of foreign countries to impose solution to relax ethnic tensions

11. Discuss the policies of consociationalism and partition.  Give some examples of where these policies have been tried, and their results.

12. Compare and contrast the patterns of ethnic politics in Kenya (as described by Koigi) and Rwanda (as illuminated in class-room video)?
Democratization

            civil-military cycle.  Sultanistic regime.  communist regime.
            third wave of democracy

Religion
            Sh'aria,      Secular State, Islamic State,  Muslim State
            millennial movements,   BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party), Ayodhya
            Liberation Theology,  Franz Fanon
            partition

Ethnicity
            Armenians, Hutu,  Tutsi, Ibo, Biafra, Yoruba, Hausa-Fulani, Sinhalese, Tamil,
            Consociationalism, partition
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