Module Code - Title:

PO5112 - RUSSIAN AND POST-SOVIET POLITICS

Year Last Offered:

2023/4

Hours Per Week:

Lecture

3

Lab

0

Tutorial

0

Other

0

Private

12

Credits

9

Grading Type:

N

Prerequisite Modules:

Rationale and Purpose of the Module:

The purpose of this course is to discover why the Soviet Union collapsed and to look at the key dilemmas confronting its successor states. This module looks at the states of the former Soviet Union, specifically Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and the states of Central Asia. All of these states emerged from the USSR at the start of the 1990s but have stalled economic and political transitions. We will examine how they come into being as states, the legacies of the USSR for them and their reform trajectories, the regimes that they have produced since the collapse of communism, the problems that they face and the pressures on their future development. Most of the course focuses on Russia as a paradigm for change against which the other states of the area can be compared in the last weeks of the course.

Syllabus:

Soviet political system and its legacies; policy choices at the end of communism; Russian politics in the Yeltsin and Putin eras; Ukraine; Belarus; Central Asia; comparing post-Soviet and other transitions; political dynamics of the post-Soviet space.

Learning Outcomes:

Cognitive (Knowledge, Understanding, Application, Analysis, Evaluation, Synthesis)

Recount the features of the USSR and their implications for post-Soviet development. Recount the paths of development for Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and Central Asia to independence and in the post-Soviet period. Discuss the main influences on post-Soviet political development. Criticise and adapt ideas from comparative politics in relation to the study of the former USSR.

Affective (Attitudes and Values)

Question the premises of research on post-Soviet political development.

Psychomotor (Physical Skills)

N/A

How the Module will be Taught and what will be the Learning Experiences of the Students:

The module is taught by lecture and seminar involving active student discussiona and presentation of research findings.