Although I ended up doing well in the class, this guy was not very nice. His one redeeming quality was that he was an interesting lecturer at times, but that may have been a result of the interesting topic. My TA was pretty nice, but I can't speak for everyone else's experience. But back to what I was saying about how he wasn't the nicest. One time I was in about the 5th row and needed to use the restroom or take a walk because I was about to fall asleep. Either way you slice it, it is a bodily need to give me a break, either mentally or physically. I inched out of the tight tight rows in Rolfe, going slowly so I didn't bump into seated classmates. It probably took 15 seconds at most. Then this guy stopped lecturing and glared at me. I went up to him to apologize afterwards and I thought we buried the hatchet. Then, the next day he sent out an email saying "The decorum in lecture has deteriorated". First off, stop using these high and mighty words. This isn't ancient Rome. Secondly, people gotta go to the bathroom. Sorry we don't want to bump all into people as we walk, it's called respecting personal space. But he was sometimes engaging. Essay scoring was confusing, wasn't clear what they were looking for whatsoever. The prompts are deceptively simple. I lucked out, that's it. Maybe try another poli sci class, your call.

Ok, first of all: DO NOT take this class as a GE unless you're SURE that you're actually interested in the topic; it's definitely not worth it just for GE credit as there are tons of other, easier, more interesting classes out there to take. Even if you're a PoliSci major and aren't sure about this class, I'd say skip it and take another of the lower divs if you can (PS20 was my favorite).

That being said, if you have a PoliSci background, are actually interested in comparative politics, and know what you're getting yourself into, I think this class can be pretty rewarding. I was lowkey pretty scared after reading the other reviews on Bruinwalk, and they're honestly not too far off the mark in some cases; the amount of work in this class is totally unnecessary for a lower div. There are 4 quizzes (2 lecture/2 reading) a week, which are pretty easy to get 100% on, but the readings can sometimes be ~50 pages when there are only 1 or 2 useful concepts you need to know. Discussion participation is required, which is a bit annoying but you can generally say pretty much anything and get credit. What makes this class an absolute FUCKton of work at times is the essays, especially the 2nd one which I probably spent ~25 hours on and was full of unnecessary busywork (doing the exact same thing for 3 countries). The average for that essay? 62%. Yikes. The final was also around a 50% average... and it was multiple choice (thankfully only worth 10% of your grade). Thies knows that this class is a ton of work, and he doesn't care what people think about it, so if that isn't for you, definitely stay away. AND the class is graded on a curve, so only the top ~25% get an A/A-, meaning you're competing against everyone else in the class for those grades.

Despite all that (or maybe because of it), I learned a TON from this class, a lot of which was pretty interesting (at least for someone who was already interested in the subject). Thies clearly knows his shit, and my TA was also SUPER smart and pretty helpful in discussions (although he was a bit rude at times). Maybe I'm a nerd, but comparative politics is a pretty cool thing to study and Thies' lectures were pretty good (especially at 1.5x speed). He can apparently be kinda mean/callous, but I basically never interacted with him because the class was asynchronous and I didn't go to office hours, so I didn't really notice; people said that he was a kind of a dick if you're doing bad in his class though. Overall, I'd recommend this class to people who already like the topic/PoliSci in general and are ok with doing a lot of work at times (mainly just the 2nd/3rd essay). Otherwise, skip this one.

Oh, and I uploaded the textbook to libgen; you're welcome :)

If you are a political science major, try to not take this as your first political science class. The content is interesting, but the papers are graded too harshly.

Professor has slow lectures. Thankfully you can watch them at 1.5x speed. Grading was harsh, and it was difficult to get an A. LOTS of reading, weekly quizzes on both reading and lectures. Participation during discussion sections was also graded harshly and hurt my grade incredibly. Not a fan of this class, and I would not recommend it unless you absolutely have to.

POL SCI 50 was the first class I took at UCLA as a freshman. Based off everyone's reviews, I thought it would be a lot worse—with all honesty, if you enjoy the material that is taught then homework assignments and readings all become part of the process of learning. I even liked that we were learning things through different mediums eg. documentaries. I felt that each homework assignment felt purposeful in developing different analytical and communication skills.
Last quarter, I didn't find that the workload was too heavy. In retrospect (having taken more classes at UCLA since) I will say that the whole debate prep, three papers, assignments and blah is relatively Much More time-consuming than a lower div class should be. That said, I had no issues completing any of the papers because the prof is right in saying that following the instructions were enough to get you a 90+ grade—just remember to insert in a lot of the common-sense connections you can make between theory and the facts that you're researching for. However, my TA was helpful during sections but stuck to giving nonspecific feedback on my papers even during office hours.
Tldr; Not as bad as the reviews make it seem. Lots of content, good range of global contexts worked in. Workload is heavy, but content is interesting enough that it's worth it, in my view. NOT an easy GE.

I had a genuine interest in the topic of this class before taking it, but I got less interested as the weeks passed. The assignments were stupid, but there were no tests so no memorization of all the information (there was a lot of information). You kind of have to do the readings, and there were a lot of them. Participation is important in discussion and you need to show that you know your stuff. I went to Thies' office hours and he seemed like a nice guy, he has a sarcastic humor which I like, but he also definitely thinks he's the shit.
Overall, if you are super interested in this class, an A is possible and you will learn a lot. If not then don't take it!!

He redesigned the class for this quarter so he eliminated the impossible tests that everyone else had written about. His assignments during my quarter were ridiculously hard, as everyone else has described, and he gave very little guidance for what he was looking for. The way the class worked was that most of your grade (something like 80%) was based on 4 assignments due every 2-3 weeks and these assignments were huge papers that required very thorough research.
However, I have taken multiple classes with him and I must say that he is very responsive to feedback so I think it is fair to assume that there is a good chance that he has adjusted his course to provide more guidance/flexibility for his assignments for upcoming quarters.

Thies clearly deeply understood many complex political science concepts, and did a good job designing the class to allow the students to process and understand those concepts. I thought the readings and reading quizzes were very relevant to course material and incredibly helpful in learning the concepts discussed in class.
I did find this course difficult, but I thought that the work was helpful in teaching students and not overly tedious. I liked the assignments we were given, and I saw the purpose of them in the scope of the class. I will say that the papers took me considerably longer than Thies estimated, maybe because I am less skilled in political science than he is. Paper 2 definitely took me at least 10 hours of research, writing, and revising.
This course involves a lot of writing and a difficult final, as well as a lot of reading and weekly assignments, so only take it if you are willing to deal with all the work...
Also: they have a very strange grading policy where the average on the final and most papers was a D or F and most people did very poorly. Then the grades were curved for a better distribution

Thies was the worst intro to UCLA I could get as an incoming freshman in Fall 2020. He was condescending, rude and made lectures miserable. His office hours were jumbled and unclear, and he gave us tons of work to stress over while purposefully being vague and unhelpful. It is a shame, because I really was engaged by some of the material, but his inconsistent grading and brutal workload made me want it over with. I will be avoiding this man for my remaining 11 semesters.

Professor Thies is, to his core, a bad professor. He cares more about making his class difficult than he does educating his students. The professor is unprepared and would tell us that he was writing assignments a week before they were due without determining whether or not it was even possible to complete them. No rubrics are provided for assignments or essays, the professor refuses to help when students attend his office hours and he is known by his students for being condescending, unhelpful and rude. If the professor were to read this review, he would likely enjoy hearing that the class is difficult. I hope he does not confuse my critique of his work as a compliment of his ability to challenge his students. I will be clear: the professor is not challenging or thoughtprovoking, he is unorganized and quite thoughtless. This class will hurt your GPA (he designed it this way; he even admitted to us that his final exam was intended to hurt our grade) and you will have gained little knowledge.