- Docente: Daniela Giannetti
- Credits: 8
- SSD: SPS/04
- Language: Italian
- Teaching Mode: Traditional lectures
- Campus: Bologna
- Corso: Second cycle degree programme (LM) in International Relations (cod. 8782)
Course contents
Collective action and collective decisions are central phenomena of political life: from Arab Spring to collective reactions to financial crisis, from deterioration of common pool resources to binding decisions by world leaders. This course will introduce students to models of collective action and collective decision making within political science. We will take a look at various environments where a group of individuals is involved in collective action or makes binding decision through some institutional mechanism (consensus, voting, negotiation and bargaining, deliberation). Decision-making environments differ in terms of number of actors involved, their degree of conflict of interest and information, as well as in terms of decision rules. This course aim at providing the basic tools to analyze collective action dilemmas, coordination failures and effects of different rules on outcomes.
In the first part of the course (20 hours) the teacher will introduce students to some basic tools from Social Choice Theory and Game Theory which allow us to analyze institutions, collective decision making and outcomes. In the second part (20 hours) students are expected to organize presentations of articles and actively participate in class discussions.
Readings/Bibliography
Students may read the following textbook:
Shepse K. and M. Boncek, Analyzing politics, New York, Norton, 2010 (second edition).
The list of papers and book chapters to be read will be given in the first class.
Teaching methods
This course is organized as a seminar. The basic format will be classroom lectures and student presentations.
Assessment methods
The assessment is based on the following elements:
- active participation (30%)
- presentation of a paper (30%)
- writing a paper of approximately 15 pages about a topic of interest (40%) to be handed in ten days before the exam.
Teaching tools
Powerpoint slides, articles and other materials will be available on line at the following website http://campus.cib.unibo.it.
Office hours
See the website of Daniela Giannetti