Scenario: You are an analyst working for a think-tank that has been contracted by the U.S. Department of State to conduct a series of Country Comparisons.
Your firm has asked you to compare the domestic political environments of India and Thailand and to suggest an hypothesis as to why they may be similar or different.
Requirement: Your analysis is to be organized by criteria, not by country. For example, you will compare each type of regime, then government, and so on following the outline below.
Identify no more than two (2) most dominant ethnic, religious, and/or ideological cleavages in the Political Culture of each country.
Identify the type of regime and form of government in each Country.
Compare the institutional qualities and rigidity of the Constitutions. Assess where each fall on the Lijphart scale.
Compare how each country distributes political power (Centralization, Federalization). Assess where each country falls on the Lijphart scale.
Compare levels of Capacity and Autonomy in each country as measures of State Power.
Compare Executive power institutions, and elections methodology. Assess where each fall on the Lijphart scale.
Compare Legislative power institutions, cameralism, and elections methodology. Assess where each fall on the Lijphart scale.
Compare Judicial power institutions. Assess where each fall on the Lijphart scale.
Identify the type of Political Economy in each Country. Assess where each fall on the Freedom vs Equity scale.
In your conclusion, identify which country is more majoritarian, and suggest a hypothesis you would test with other cases.
Textbooks and sources to use (mandotary):
- Patrick O’Neil, Karl Fields, and Don Share, Cases and Concepts in Comparative Politics 2nd Edition (WW Norton, NY, 2021, ISBN: 9780393422955)
- Arend Lijphart, Patterns of Democracy (Yale University Press: New Haven, 2012, ISBN: 9780300172027).
Sample Solution