The topics courses below are typically offered under "Topics in International Relations," INTRL-GA 1731 (4 points) or 1732 (2 points). Offerings vary from semester to semester.
Course Listing
Asia's Revolutions: China/India/Vietnam, 1885 - 1962
Branding: Places & Nations
Diplomacy Disturbed: Advocacy to Marketing
East Asian Political Economy
G-20: Problems and Issues in Global Governance
Global Environmental Governance
Global Marketing
Global Networked Culture
Inequality and Populism in Latin America
Intellectual Origins of IR Theories
New World Orders
Planning for Chaos in the Middle East
Political Economy of Global Capitalism
Political Psychology and International Relations
Rethinking Security in the 21st Century
Risk and Resilience in the Global Economy
Russian Politics since 1991
Transitions to Democracy in Europe
US Persian Gulf Policy
Gender, Race, and International Relations
The Ukraine Conflicts - Imperialism, Regionalism, and International Politics
Democracy and its Discontents - Southeast Asia and the World
U.S.-Latin American Relations - WWII to the Present
Citizenship in a Digital Age
Course Descriptions
Asia's Revolutions: China/India/Vietnam, 1885 - 1962
Moss Roberts
This course is offered by the Department of East Asian Studies. For more information, please contact EAS.
The aim of this introductory course is to develop a comparative understanding of the national independence/liberation movements in China, India, and Vietnam, as well as the regional and global contexts within which they unfolded, in the period 1885 - 1962. Attention is given to the continual wars in and involving Asia as well as to some of the figures in modern Asian history who played a major role in the transition of India and Vietnam from colonial subordination to independent nationhood and of China from its semi-colonial status to liberation. The principal figures who will be studied and compared are Mohandas Gandhi and Mao Zedong. In addition, we will study the role of Ho Chi Minh in order to develop a third angle of comparison. The course will give due attention to other relevant figures such as Jinnah and Nehru in the case of India; Sun Yat-sen and Chiang Kai-shek in the case of China; Phan Boi Chau in the case of Vietnam.
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Branding: Places & Nations
Ido Aharoni
This course aims to introduce students to the fundamental concepts and principles of non-product branding in the context of managing the reputation and performance of Nations, Cities, and places. The course will explore key concepts and terminology in the following fields: marketing, nation branding, place-positioning, and public diplomacy. During the course, students will be introduced to key elements in the practice of nation branding through the presentation of various methodologies. The course does not assume any specific previous knowledge of non-product branding. A general familiarity with the idea of places as brands should be a sufficient foundation. The course will serve as an intensive introduction through lectures, case studies, seminar papers, and group project-based work. Each course session will explore a different dimension of the subject matter and will provide a practical model for non-product branding.
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Diplomacy Disturbed: Advocacy to Marketing
Ido Aharoni
In the age of information, social media, and self-designed news-feeds old-fashioned diplomacy are increasingly becoming antiquated. Designed in a different era, foreign ministries struggle to adapt and adjust their diplomatic operations to the new technological environment. The seven-session course is structured as an exploration of the challenges governments and Foreign Services engage due to disruptive influences of digital technology, where traditional practices and methodologies are not only challenged by the ever-changing technological environment but also by deep and profound demographic, social, political and economic changes. The class will examine, through several case studies and real-life examples, how the information revolution brought about a fundamental paradigm shift that affected the goals and methods of traditional diplomacy. The course will explore the impact this revolution has had on the core practice of diplomacy by policy-makers and practitioners. Students will compare conventional diplomatic practices with strategies that challenge tradition and convention, questioning basic notions about the role of diplomats, working to separate perception from what is sustainable, while learning to effectively design new diplomatic practices.
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East Asian Political Economy
James Nolt
The U.S. has now engaged in a trade conflict with China broader but somewhat parallel to a similar conflict with Japan decades ago. Both conflicts have been predicated on these economies being of a different species than the “free market” economies that predominate in Western economic globalization since World War II. Japan during the later 20th century and China today were both claimed to compete unfairly by breaking the ostensible rules of the free market and the liberal world economic order. Postwar institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and World Trade Organization are designed to prescribe rules by which free-market competition can flourish globally while progressively lowering government barriers to trade. Japan, South Korea, and China have all been accused of violating the competitive rules so systemically that anti-liberal protectionist policies must restrain them. We examine whether East Asian economies are really so alien to the world order. We critically challenge the benchmark concepts of “market economy,” “free competition,” and “market prices” that underlie the rules of the global order, such as the rules for compensatory tariffs in cases of dumping. Are Japan and China unfair competitors or just successful ones? What is fair if there is no free market benchmark? Whereas most rules of the global institutions assume that the government's obstacles are the problem and freer markets are the solution, the increasing prevalence of private business power belies this conceit.
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G-20: Problems and Issues in Global Governance
Muserref Yetim
This seminar aims to guide students through some of the most challenging issues facing the G-20 in the field of international economic cooperation. In this course, we will explore and devise strategies for the G-20 countries to tackle current global governance problems that have intensified as a result of the continuous deepening of economic and financial integrations of the world economy and the heightened risks associated with climate change and global health threats. The speed and the extent of these developments have often made formal international institutions inadequate for dealing with serious global governance challenges. Thus the way is paved for the emergence of informal structures of global governance such as the G-7 and the G-20 to coordinate actions of the member states with the goal of achieving stable and sustainable world economic growth that benefits all.
In this course, we will study the most challenging G-20 issues under the four broad categories. The first category deals with trade and trade-related issues including WTO reform, TRIPs, and development. The second issue area covers finance and finance-related challenges including international monetary policy coordination, international financial crises, rising debt levels, and the prevention of tax avoidance. The third issue area covers global health threats, political instability and conflicts, and migration, and refugees. Finally, the fourth issue area focuses on climate change, energy and environment policy, and disaster risk.
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Global Environmental Governance: Approaches, Structures, and Diplomacy
Robert Dry
Fifty years ago, nations ambitiously undertook to address grave global environmental challenges at the Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment. It set the stage for subsequent ‘earth summits’ (Rio, Johannesburg, etc.) and negotiations for multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs), now numbering in their hundreds, such as the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal. International institutions, including many within the UN system and non-state actors, formed to govern the earth summits and legacies thereof. Students analyze the nature and effectiveness of conferences, MEAs, institutions, and international law cases in policy papers. The seminar tracks developments in contemporary environmental diplomacy, including UNFCCC COP 26 in Glasgow.
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Global Marketing
Giuseppe Ammendola
This course looks at international marketing and its crucial connections with international business practices and with the policy challenges of economic globalization and interdependence. Through lectures, in-class training, discussions, and the examination of case studies we look at the interplay of national, international, and global perspectives on marketing research, segmentation and positioning, competition, sourcing, branding, product development, pricing, logistics, and e-commerce. Drawing from political science, economics, business, sociology, psychology, law, and history, we shall examine the marketing challenges faced by decision-makers not just in the private but also in the public and nonprofit sectors. The study of marketing within and across frontiers will permit students to deepen their understanding of some of the most powerful actors and forces in the world economy and the current debates concerning them. Most importantly, throughout the course, we shall be looking at how lessons drawn from global business practices are applicable to the marketing of governments, nonprofits, places, and people, including ourselves. Overall the teaching is informed by sharing with students the insights derived from multiple disciplines, cultures, and languages to help them gain valuable real-world skills.
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Global Networked Culture
Kimon Keramidas
Over the past forty years the entire world has felt the effects of the confluence of three phenomena that have caused enormous social and cultural change: globalization, the information revolution, and the rise of the network society. Central to each of these phenomena has been technological change that has increased our interconnectedness and led to the development of new modes of culture and means for communication. This course will engage with this dynamic era through a distinctive interdisciplinary lens in order to consider how international network technologies have dramatically changed the production, distribution, and consumption of culture and dynamically altered relations between nations, communities, and individuals. Through discussion of readings of central thinkers–such as Manuel Castells, Nicholas Garnham, Arjun Appadurai, David Harvey, Alex Galloway, Yochai Benkler, and Shoshanna Zuboff–, the analysis of a diverse array of media texts, international case studies (The United States, China, and South Korea), and weekly reviews of new developments in this field of study we will ask: What will be the fate of traditional culture power structures in an increasingly decentralized cultural economy? How does the Internet bring us together, and how does it push us apart? Is it possible to overcome deeply ingrained cultural differences through proximity in digital and virtual spaces? Are individuals now audiences, consumers, or data commodities?
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Inequality and Populism in Latin America
Federico Sor
This course will aim at a better understanding of populism by focusing on the inequalities that have often given rise to it in modern societies, and which more often than not fall outside scholars' purview. The course will focus on Latin America, where the “paradigmatic” cases of populism have entailed direct appeals to the people in order to challenge political institutions designed to preserve long-standing inequalities. To better understand the poverty and resulting antagonisms in “neo-colonial” societies, we will examine the collaboration between local elites and foreign or international actors in perpetuating asymmetrical arrangements and dispossession through unequal trade agreements, foreign control of resources, commercial and financial double standards, capital mobility, austerity policies, etc. The course will therefore consider Latin America from a global perspective. Some cases of presumed populism outside Latin America will be considered.
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Intellectual Origins of IR Theories
Mehmet Tabak
What are the grounds for the academic claims that we live in an essentially anarchic world in which the primary actors are rational agents, and that these agents are ultimately motivated by self-preservation and/or self-interest? Why do some intellectuals more optimistically believe in the possibility of mutual recognition, cooperation, and benefit? Why do others insist that both domestic and international relations are hierarchical, exploitative, and imperialistic? In short, how do various intellectual traditions explain the motivations that guide individuals and organized communities to participate in political and economic activities? Relatedly, how do they understand political power, and its relationship to the economy?
Intellectuals of all stripes have been pondering these and other similar questions for centuries. In our times, their insights have crystallized into various theories of international relations, such as realism(s), liberalism(s), and Marxism(s). If so, the contemporary IR theories owe much intellectual debt to their predecessors. Proceeding from this premise, “Intellectual Origins of IR Theories" simultaneously examines the profound insights of the earlier intellectuals, and links these insights to their contemporary variants. The main purpose of this critical examination is to help students gain a more profound appreciation of these theories. Such an appreciation is also a promising step toward an improved understanding of the real world in which we live. In order to successfully attain its aims, this course encourages attentive reading, informed and spirited discussion, and engaged written-responses.
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New World Orders
Mehmet Tabak
This course examines the post-Cold War global order(s) from both historical and theoretical perspectives, focusing on some of the major systemic transformations and the ways they have been framed. During its first few weeks, we will study several important perspectives on the nature of the new world order. How did it come into existence? How have some prominent IR scholars conceptualized it? Does the new order reflect the final triumph of free-market economy and liberal democracy or the “clash of civilizations”? Or is it more meaningful to understand it as a global capitalist system, created and orchestrated by the United States? We will then consider the related issues of whether American “hegemony” is receding and, if so, what the structure of the new order might look like in the near future. Will the liberal/capitalist world order remain intact, even if (or when) the United States loses its preponderance? Will the new century have many poles or “belong” to China? During the third phase of the course, we will consider several contradictions of the global liberal-capitalist order and ask whether such contradictions herald its undoing. For instance, is hyper-globalization undermining democratic regimes and the sovereignty of states? Is globalization on the retreat, giving way to new forms of nationalism and populism?
The more general, academic aims of the course include helping students: become sufficiently familiar with a variety of important perspectives on these related issues; develop their own perspectives on the same; and, enhance their reading, writing, and oral presentation skills.
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Planning for Chaos in the Middle East
Chuck Freilich
The Mideast is one of the world’s most volatile and unpredictable regions, a source of rapid and seemingly endless socioeconomic, political and military change. In these circumstances, policy planning appears futile and decision-makers tend to resigned despair. It is, however, precisely in conditions of chaos that planning becomes most critical to reduce the incidence of policy failures. We can learn to plan for chaos. Students will assume the role of actual decision-makers and gain real-world experience, of use for future employment, in conducting strategic policy formulation processes, as done in leading national security institutions around the world. Issues studied (and practiced) include some of the primary challenges facing Middle Eastern countries today, such as regime stability and political reform in the post Arab Spring Mideast; preventing nuclear proliferation in the Mideast; conflict and war between Iran and the US/Israel and Hezbollah-Israel; Israeli-Palestinian peace process; rebuilding Arab states - Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen; counter-terrorism in the Mideast; energy, politics and socioeconomic reform in the Mideast; insurgency and counter-insurgency in the Mideast; clashing hegemonic aspirations and the balance of power in the Mideast.
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Political Economy of Global Capitalism
Mehmet Tabak
This course is divided into three modules, which examine the political economy of global(izing) capitalism from a variety of vantage points, utilizing both historical and theoretical perspectives.
Module I first takes stock of such basic concepts as globalization, capitalism, and political economy, and then proceeds to make sense of several areas of academic and practical interest: trade, development strategies, global production and MNC, the international monetary system, and finance capital. The main purpose of this module is to introduce students to a host of key concepts, theorems. and foundational perspectives on the international/global political economy of capitalism.
Module II basically considers several competing perspectives on the global political-economic order. First, it considers the historical role of the United States (the American state) in the making of global capitalism, specifically highlighting several key issues that have animated much scholarly debate: the role of states in making global capitalism possible; the status and nature of American hegemony (or “empire”) in the recent world order; and the nexus between political power and the recurrent crisis of capitalism. Second, Module II considers a perspective that depicts this order as a multipolar system of states in which capital—rather than states—reigns supreme. Third, it assesses a crucial issue that has attracted much attention during the last few decades: the rise of China and its implications to the global political-economic order.
Module III examines in some detail the link between global capitalism and three specific areas of scholarly interest: austerity, inequality, and the environment.
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Political Psychology and International Relations
David Segall
Perhaps more than ever, an understanding of political psychology is required to explain rapidly unfolding events in the global arena. This course will familiarize students with the central role that political psychology plays in the conduct of International Relations. We will explore the origins of the application of political psychology to IR and the relationship’s rapid growth to prominence in recent years. We will examine the utility, limitations, and specific applications of political psychology to IR. Throughout the course, we will relate the course material to past and current affairs, looking at the ways in which political psychology enhances our understanding of key developments and tendencies in IR. Our discussions will feature some of the most interesting – and often counter-intuitive! – experiments and results.
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Rethinking Security in the 21st Century
Asli Peker
Grounded in critical security studies, securitization and human security literatures, this course critically examines the concept of security as conventionally construed , considers alternative conceptualizations, and explores a range of existing or potential security challenges we face in the 21st century: from global warming, climate change and mass extinction to conspiracy theories, disinformation and deep fakes; from emerging infectious diseases, pandemics and superbugs to 5G, artificial intelligence and gene editing to rising extremism and democratic decline.
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Risk and Resilience in the Global Economy
Akram Esanov
As the nature of globalization and the structure of the global economy have been undergoing unprecedented changes, the world’s economic and political order is expected to enter into a new era. Political movements that call for fundamental change in the status quo on international trade and immigration are gaining momentum in Europe and the United States, while the rise of China is reshaping economic and political relationships in Asia and globally. This globalization backlash and re-emergence of national politics will produce changes in the global institutional architecture and global governance. The objective of this course is to explore the main opportunities and trade-offs faced by governments, international organizations, businesses and citizens as the global economy enters a new phase. In addition, the course will discuss a wide range of factors that explain country-level differences in policy responses and resilience to global shocks. Through a combination of lectures, classroom discussions and case studies, the course presents the necessary conceptual and empirical foundations to understand today’s global challenges.
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Russian Politics since 1991
Sergey Sanovich
Are we doomed? Is the future – tyranny, corruption, and war? Is the nature of great power competition fatal for democracy, the rule of law, and liberalism? And why Vladimir Putin, a mediocre mid-level secret police agent from the backwaters of the Cold War, came to symbolize the urgency of these questions in the early 2020s?
These are just some of the questions we will cover in the Russian Politics class. Our discussion will be organized around a select few turning points that determined the trajectory of the Russian journey and its global consequences, with an eye also on how social science informed – and learnt from – these developments. In the process, we will learn a lot about Russia, even more about how democracies and autocracies work and fail, and, simultaneously, will unlearn many myths that continue to surround all these subjects, starting with the claim that Putin was inevitable and is irreplaceable.
Come to learn which lessons Putin took from oligarchs who engineered his rise to power, which from Stalin, and which from his former comrades-in-arms at the KGB foreign intelligence directorate. Stay to discover how Russians live aside from Putin and what are the prospects of bottom-up democratization.
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Transitions to Democracy in Europe
Thomas Zittel
This seminar discusses key developments in the evolution and advancement of democracy across European nation states. We will go back to its early beginnings in British and French politics, and trace developments in executive accountability, voting rights, proportional representation, and civil rights regimes across Europe. In this, we picture democracy as a system of government that is in a constant state of flux. This involves transitions to democratic governance, transitions between different modes of democracy, but also transitions from democracy. Our aim is to unveil the social, political, and economic sources of democracy to understand where it came from and where it is going.
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U.S. Persian Gulf Policy
Robert Dry
This seminar takes a deep dive into the international relations of the Persian Gulf. It examines the history of U.S. foreign policy, as well as current U.S. interests, on both sides of the Persian Gulf. Students build a formal briefing book for a senior official visiting the region for the first time.
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Gender, Race, and International Relations
Orsolya Lehotai
How can we think about and analyze international relations at the intersection of gender, race and sexuality? How does a critical intersectional approach help us understand the study and practice of international relations today? How are racial hierarchies intertwined with gendered relations of power and what is their relevance in shaping global politics and foreign policy? What might be the relationship between gendered and racialized actors of states and processes of securitization and militarization? How can feminist and post-colonial IR theories help us understand the normative logic of state-making, nationalism, imperialism, interstate conflict, war and political violence? This course brings together some of the core concepts of international relations with theories of race, gender, sexuality to provide various points of entry for approaching these questions critically.
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The Ukraine Conflicts - Imperialism, Regionalism, and Internationalism
Nicholas R. Banner
The course will examine the origins, course, and implications of the Russian invasions of Ukraine in 2014 and 2022. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Ukraine’s future has been debated, contested, and seen through their own strategic lens by outside powers, culminating in the Russian invasion of February 2022. Throughout this thirty-year period, Ukrainian governments have sought a durable equilibrium between the two great powers on their doorstep – Russia and the European Union. The Ukrainian people have repeatedly shown their preference for an independent and democratic Ukraine, yet the economic and strategic position of Ukraine has become more precarious. We will explore the relationship between those factors, tracing the course of European, Russian, and wider (notably US) attitudes to Ukraine since its independence, the Ukrainian response, and the events that culminated in Russian decisions to invade. To do so, we will consider in turn long-term Russian, European, US, and NATO strategic priorities; the history and politics of post-1991 Ukraine; and the many ways in which the course of the invasion and all of these actors’ responses to it – political, military, and economic – illuminate the current structure and practice of international relations. This course will be of interest to all IR students – and in particular those with a concentration in Russian & Slavic Studies, European & Mediterranean Studies, US Foreign Policy, or International Politics & Business.
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Democracy and its Discontents - Southeast Asia and the World
Sidney Jones & Margaret Scott
This seminar focuses on how democracies emerge from dictatorships, how they consolidate or decline, and how these processes are shaped by key actors, including elected leaders, civil society, and security forces. It will examine under what conditions democracies give rise to populism, majoritarianism, and extremism, and the conditions that lead majorities in multi-ethnic societies to claim they are under siege by minorities and outsiders. It will also look at violent extremist movements and their relationship to the state: most treat democratic governments as the enemy, some see majoritarian leaders as partners. It will also look at how the processes of democratic growth and decline affect women and how social media has given women a greater role than they otherwise would have in anti-democratic movements. The instructors will draw on examples from Southeast Asia, particularly Indonesia, Philippines, and Myanmar, but will encourage students to compare developments with their own experience and think about policies at the local, national or international level that might curb democratic decline or strengthen protections for minorities. Readings will draw on Western and non-Western sources, and assignments will include short policy briefs as well as a research paper. This course will be of interest to all IR students – and in particular those with a concentration in Asian Studies.
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U.S.-Latin American Relations - WWII to the Present
Jorge Castañeda
This course seeks to analyze the dynamics and issues that describe the relations between the United States and Latin America since the end of World War II. A complete picture of the current state of affairs in the hemisphere and the reasons that led to it require an analysis in three different – but related – dimensions. To cover the first one, the course analyzes historical benchmarks that contextualize particular overt American interventions in the region, dissecting its causes, operation and consequences. In a second dimension, the course looks at topics that have permeated the relationship between the United States and Latin America over this period. Because of their typically cross-national nature, they illustrate a different set of dynamics and concerns that have fueled tensions in the relationship. A third and final dimension concerns recent developments in Latin America that affect and have been affected by U.S. foreign policy. Their novelty suggests that these issues will remain relevant at least in the immediate future.
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Citizenship in a Digital Age
Kimon Kermidas
Data-driven campaigns, inaccurate polling, hacked email systems, social media disinformation, hyper-polarized media coverage, debates over electoral tabulation, the evidence is all around us that the digital technologies of the 21st century have become central features of global political discourse and processes. This course considers how these new technologies have altered our approach to acquiring and critiquing data and information, mediated our modes of social communication, and in turn fundamentally changed the experience of being a citizen. The course starts with foundational readings on theories of citizenship and the development and transition into a digital networked society. From there we continue on to the development of large-scale networked information systems, transitions from old to new media, and a critique of expanded social connectivity through platforms such as social media. Additional topics include methods of communication between government representatives and citizens, the role of digital tools and algorithms in shaping polling methodology, demographic segmentation through digitally-enhanced mapmaking (see gerrymandering), representations of race, gender, and ethnicity in the digital public sphere, and online protest and activism. Readings will include work by Aristotle, Balibar, Castells, Habermas, Hardt and Negri, Galloway, and Tufecki amongst others.
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