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Module Code: POU33051

Module Name: Democracy and Development A 2024-25

  • ECTS Weighting: 5
  • Semester/Term Taught: Semester 1
  • Contact Hours: One 2-hour lecture per week; 1 tutorial per fortnight
  • Module Personnel: Lecturer - Michelle D’Arcy
  • Office hours: Email for appointment

Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this module students should be able to:

  • Understand the relationship between political institutions and economic development
  • Debate which institutions matter most for development: states, nations or regimes
  • Evaluate the historical evolution of democracy and nation states in the West
  • Compare Western experiences of political and economic development with those of developing countries today

Module Learning Aims

By the end of this module, students will be familiar with the major debates about how different institutions matter for development.


Module Content

In this module we will address the question of how political institutions affect economic development.  We will examine three core sets of institutions - state, nation, and regime – examining their character and development in both historical and contemporary perspective.  We will look at how democratic nation states emerged in the West, comparing this to the experiences of contemporary developing countries. We will consider the major theories on how these institutions impact on development and what empirical evidence we have about this relationship.

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Recommended Reading List

  • Tilly, Charles. 1992. Coercion, Capital and European States AD 990-1992. Blackwell Publishing.
  • Fukuyama, Francis. 2011. The Origins of Political Order: From Prehuman Times to the French Revolution. Macmillan.
  • Walle, Nicolas van de. 2001. African Economies and the Politics of Permanent Crisis, 1979-1999. Cambridge University Press.
  • Herbst, Jeffrey. 2000. States and Power in Africa. Princeton University Press.

Assessment Details

Attendance at tutorials and response papers - 10%

Mid-Term Essay - 30%

Final Essay - 60%

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