Synopses & Reviews
This workbook includes a Windows version of MicroCase ExplorIt, a user-friendly program that makes it easy for students to manipulate and learn from real data without getting bogged down in complicated statistical software. Over two dozen research-quality data files are included in this package, along with 14 exercise worksheets (one per chapter) that let students see the impact of the concepts they study. This unique workbook/software allows students to "do" comparative politics, not just read about it.
About the Author
Michael K. Le Roy is a professor of Political Science and Executive Vice President and Dean of the Faculty at Whitworth University in Washington state. He received his Ph.D. in Political Science at Vanderbilt University, and he was a Fulbright scholar at Gothenburg University in Sweden. In addition to his extensive research and travel in Europe and Latin America, Professor Le Roy has studied and traveled in Central and South America. His research on civil society and social capital has been published in Comparative Politics. Michael Le Roy returned to Whitworth in fall 2002 from Wheaton College, in Illinois, where he served as chair of the department of political science. After teaching three years for the Political Science department, Le Roy accepted the position as Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of Faculty. Le Roy still teaches for the Political Science department and continues as a team member for the Central America Study-Service Program. His research on civil society, xenophobia, and the European Union has been published in the journal, COMPARATIVE POLITICS. He is also the author of COMPARATIVE POLITICS: AN INTRODUCTION (4th Edition), and RESEARCH METHODS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE (7th Edition). Le Roy won Wheaton College's faculty achievement award for excellence in teaching in 1998 and a similar award from the American Political Science Association's honor society, Pi Sigma Alpha, in 1999.
Table of Contents
Part I: DOING COMPARITIVE POLITICS WITH EXPLORIT. 1. The Nation-State. 2. People, Populations, and the State Capacity. 3. Organizing Political Systems: First, Second, and Third Worlds? Part II: POLITICS AND GOVERNMENT IN LIBERAL DEMOCRACIES. 4. Political Culture in Liberal Democracies. 5. Political Participation: Making Democracy Work. 6. Electoral Systems in Liberal Democracies. Part III: COMMUNIST AND POST-COMMUNIST SOCIETIES. 7. After Communism. 8. Russia, Poland, and Democratic Transition. Part IV: NEWLY INDUSTRIALIZING COUNTRIES. 9. Newly Industrializing Countries. 10. Asian Values? Political Culture in South Korea and India. Part V: LESS DEVELOPED COUNTRIES AND MARGINAL STATES. 11. War, Politics, and Poverty in LDCs and Marginal States. 12. Social Capital in Nigeria and South Africa. Part VI: THE ISLAMIC WORLD. 13. The Islamic World. 14. Islam and Politics in Pakistan and Turkey. Appendix: Variable Names and Sources.