Calendar

First Half of the Class taught by Prof. Daron Acemoglu

LEC # TOPICS KEY DATES
Voters (Sessions 1–7) 
1–2 Collective Choices and Voting  
3 Voting and Information Aggregation  
4–5 Votes and Political Decisions in Practice  
6–7 Election Politics Gone Wrong: Lobbying, Vote Buying, Clientelism, Coercion, and Populism. Pset #1 due after lecture #5
Politicans (Sessions 8–10)
8–9 Political Agency  
10 Political Agency Gone Wrong Pset #2 due after lecture #9
Policies (Sessions 11–14)
11 Economic Policy under Representative Democracy  
12 Political Compromise  
13–14 Economic Policy under Nondemocratic Institutions Pset #3 due after lecture #14

Second Half of the Class taught by Prof. Benjamin Olken

TOPICS KEY DATES
Conflict (Sessions 15–17)
Theory: Why Does Conflict Take Place? Bargaining Failures and Other Reasons  
Why Does Conflict Occur? Costs, Benefits, and Other Factors  
Counterinsurgency  
The Costs of Conflict Pset #4 due after lecture #17
Collective Action (Sessions 18 & 19)
Collective Action and Group Size  
Collective Action and Ethnic Heterogeneity  
Social Capital and Collective Action  
Promoting Collective Action  
Can Stimulating Collective Actions Change Institutions?  
Decentralization and Local Capture  
Media (Sessions 20 & 21)
Political Influence on Media  
Media Bias and Voting  
Media's Impact on Policy  
Media and Protest  
Bureaucracy (Sessions 22 & 23)
Do Bureaucrats Matter?  
Incentives for and Allocation of Bureaucrats  
Selection of Bureaucrats  
Rules vs. Discretion Pset #5 due after lecture #23
Corruption (Sessions 24–27)
Efficiency Costs  
The Official's Decisions to Be Corrupt: Wages, Incentives, and Selection  
The IO of Corruption Pset #6 due after lecture #25
Corruption and Politics