This course is basically a fusion of comparative politics theory and modern European political history. Alexander does an excellent job of giving you the basics of the former so you can then apply it to the latter, which is ripe with case studies. Try to keep up with lecture (the readings can be fairly dense and scattered) and get a decent TA and this should be a very good experience in which you learn to stand a lot.

Alexander is an absolutely amazing lecturer and definitely knows his stuff. The reading load is heavy -over the course of the semester, you'll write 6 one page response papers comparing the weeks' readings. Two major papers (4 pages each) are do-able. Alexander gives a great introduction to theories of comparative poltics while applying broader concepts to case studies in europe. Loved this class-- highly recommended!!

The class is really interesting, the lectures can be repetitive sometimes and there's a lot of dense reading. But overall its not a hard class as long as you do most of the readings, cause the grade is mainly two short papers and a final.

Lots of reading, but interesting class. Alexander is an enthusiastic lecturer.

The class was very interesting, and the professor was a great lecturer.

Fantastic class. Really tough to get a good grade in this class, but it was more than worth it. Lots of required reading but only 1/3 of it is reallyy heavily emphasized for the papers and final blue-book exam.

I really don't see why this class has such great reviews. Professor Alexander's lectures are boring and repetitive. Alexander will also go on several rants over the course of the semester on everything from why you can't use laptops to why forming study groups is a violation of the honor code. He will tell long boring stories and then rush through the essentials of the 50 minute lecture in 10. I would not recommend this class to anyone. Your success in this class depends completely on your TA.

I loved Alexander - I don't know why everyone thought the class was so difficult. As long as you focus on the readings that HE discusses at length in class, you're fine. I got an A without killing myself and doing 60-70% of the reading. Papers are only four pages and there are only two of them, so not so bad there.

I don't understand where all the good reviews come from--lectures usually consisted of Alexander ranting about a specific, and usually simple, subject for the first half of the class, then rushing through the useful topics. Also, a lot of the readings made little sense, to the point where our TA flat-out told us not to use their arguments in our papers.

Alexander is an okay lecturer. He tries to be funny but most of his jokes are lame. He is very knowledgeable of the subject but sometimes what he says doesn't correlate with the readings. Take this class if you are really interested in politics, if not, it'll bore you to death.