Organized thematically around important questions in comparative politics - who rules? what explains political behavior? where and why? - Introducing Comparative Politics, Fifth Edition, integrates a set of extended case studies of 11 countries that vividly illustrate issues in cross-national context. Serving as touchstones, the cases are placed within the chapters where they make the most sense --not separated from the theory or in a separate volume - helping students make connections between the two earlier in the semester.