Daniel Ziblatt
Gen Ed 1204 | Spring 2026 | Course Listing | Canvas Site
Tuesday & Thursday, 12:00 PM – 1:15 PM
What gives rise to democracies and what leads them to die?
What is democracy? What gives rise to it and what leads it to die? This is a globally focused, historically grounded course in which we explore the origins, successes, and failures of democratic systems around the world from the 18th century to today. Through case studies ranging from the U.S. Constitution and Weimar Germany to contemporary Hungary and India, students will gain a deeper understanding of how democracies are built—and how they unravel. The course will focus on the difficult decisions leaders and citizens have had to make in fraught moments to ask what lessons we can learn about how citizens and leaders today can effectively defend democracy. The aim of the course is to learn from the past to understand what causes democracy to succeed and fail today and what can be to done to defend it.