BA Politics and International Relations

This module is a core module in the BA International Relations and provides a general introduction to the discipline of International Relations and to major themes in world politics. Major theories and approaches to world politics are covered, including Realism, Liberalism, Constructivism, Marxism, Poststructuralist, Feminism, and Postcolonial Approaches. Topics to be covered will include issues of war and peace, power, global political economy, identities and ideologies, environmental politics, technological change, justice and human rights, empire, and the crisis of liberal international order. The course pays particular attention to the relationship between the discipline of International Relations as a field of knowledge and its application and/or relevance to the experience and interests of actors in Asia, Africa and the Middle East.

Introduction to Global History provides students with a broad understanding of the development of the modern world system. Beginning with 1492, it traces how the world became increasingly integrated and connected – economically, politically, militarily and socially, and what that means for how the world works today. The module begins by asking what we might mean by ‘global history,’ and then considers global phenomena including empire, slavery, colonialism and revolution, through primary and secondary sources. Through the module, we will show how and where that past interacts with the present.

The module is organised around debates in four areas: (1) a set of scene setting questions to introduce the material; (2) conceptual frameworks, derived from the scholarly tradition of political economy and world politics, including liberalism, Marxism, gender-based approaches, and racial capitalism; (3) the post-WWII history of governing the capitalist system, including attention to finance, trade, development, and energy and the environment; and (4) contemporary issues transfixing the world economy, including the global ecological crisis, the global financial crisis and its fallout, the politics of trade regulation, socio-economic inequalities, new concerns around technology, the political economy of work, and macro debates on capitalism and its possible futures. Students are asked to think critically about how the politics of the economy is conceived, governed, and experienced, in particular through evaluating dynamics of power.

This is a core module in both the BA Politics and BA International Relations degrees and provides a general introduction to methods of political analysis. The module provides the foundation for further study of Politics and International Relations, covering such areas as philosophy of social science, scientific methods, theoretical and methodological debates and skills key to critical reading, writing and analysis. Substantive areas of coverage include debates over structure and agency, politics and policy, historical methods, qualitative and quantitative approaches to the study of politics and international relations, measurement, inference and interpretation, the use of evidence in argumentation, narrative and language. The module is designed to complement other foundational modules in the Department of Politics and International Studies.

This Module provides an introduction to the foundational concepts of political theory and the study of politics. Students will be closely reading and analysing classic and more contemporary texts in political thought. Students will read texts by key thinkers such as Plato, Hobbes, Rousseau, Carole Pateman, Karl Marx, Franz Fanon, Charles Mills, Angela Davis and Gandhi. Through them, we will study the history of political thought, as well as discuss problems of the present moment.

This course not only covers major concepts and theories in the study of Comparative Politics, but also offers empirical analyses of the government and politics in a select group of countries. The course covers a wide range of issues, including the formation of the nation-state, democratization, authoritarianism, political culture, political development, comparative political economy, nationalism, ethnic politics, politics of religion, and political institutions. The course will also discuss some debates in Comparative Politics that have been important in the policy-making community in recent decades, such as state-building, role of the state in economy, the concept of social capital, and the effort to promote democracy around the world. Although paying attention to countries in Asia, Middle East, and Africa, a select group of Western countries will also be studied in a comparative format.

The purpose of this module is to introduce you to the different theoretical and conceptual approaches to the study of international organisations (IOs), and to explore both the cross-cutting, and organisation-specific, contemporary debates and issues that surround them. The module will begin with a focus on the various approaches to the study of IOs and global governance, some of the theoretical lenses through which we can understand their importance to world politics, and a historical examination of their role in the international security regime governing the use of force. The module will then move to an examination of individual IOs and regimes, including those governing human rights and international criminal accountability, as well as international trade, finance, development. We will conclude with an exploration of, and comparison to, regional organisations, as well as a look at how we might understand the future of regional and global approaches to the governance of migration.

This module is organised into three clusters of topics. First, it introduces the subject matter through attention to major players, patterns of behaviour, and forms of power in the trading system. This context serves as a foundation for an overview of the institutional governance of trade over the past fifty years. Second, the discussion dives into trade-related issue areas that have sparked political interest in recent years, including goods and services, intellectual property, and investment rules. Third, all these topics are brought together in an evaluation of the current strategies of the main regulatory power centres of the world economy: the US, the EU, and China. For students who have taken Introduction to Political Economy, this module serves as a further extension of previous debates but has also been designed to accommodate students who are approaching political economy for the first time.

This module seeks to provide UG students taking politics degree, alongside other interested students at the department, an advanced background in key issues in postcolonial political thought. It will work on some of the key issue and key authors in the field, including questions of translation and translatability, decolonization, subaltern studies, and more.

This course seeks to provide a more holistic approach to the role of religion in contemporary world politics. The course will engage with a number of religious traditions from across the World in order to interogate questions of secularism, violence, religious nationalism, civil society, soft power initiatives, and conflict resolution. What role does religion play in addressing the major crises of the present day? The course will also address methodological questions raised by the engagment with diverse religious traditions, as well as the uses of religion as an analytical category more broadly. We will ask whether the significance of religion can be easily fit into existing IR models or whether taking religion seriously requires a more radical departure.

This module introduces students to the phenomenon of war and demonstrates its ubiquity across time and space in human affairs, and develops an account of war as a constitutive force in the production of world politics past, present and future.

International Relations of the Middle East

International Relations of South Asia will give students a broad and comprehensive introduction to this subject. Beginning with conventional IR theory disciplinary frames, it will explore inter-state relations in the South Asian region including the history of conflict between India and Pakistan, the nature of Indian dominance/hegemony over the South Asian region, the place of Afghanistan in conceptualisations of ‘South Asia’, as well as the security perspectives of smaller states in the region including Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. Other topics in the course will examine non-conventional security issues including questions of economic and environmental security posed by the sharing of international rivers and climate change, as well as the human security issues provoked by ethnic and other forms of conflict in the region.

This course examines the international politics of sub-Saharan Africa since Independence organised around four main themes. The first concentrates on the emergence of African states, the nature and analysis of that statehood and the degrees of conflict and cooperation between African states. The second theme looks at the insertion of African states into the international order, including the economic order and their participation in international politics. The third theme assesses the period after the end of the Cold War and concentrates on three main sub themes: firstly the nature of conflict within Africa and the emergence of a greater degree of outside intervention in that conflict; secondly the attempt, also largely by outside agencies, to effect long-term fundamental change within African societies; thirdly the ways in which African states have changed regional organisations to meet a new international environment. The last theme raises the question whether new developments in global politics (e.g. the growth of China) are fundamentally changing the international position of African states.

This course is designed to provide students with a theoretically informed and comparative introduction to key issues in the contemporary international relations of East Asia. East Asia is defined as the states of the Northeast Asia (in particular, China, Korea, Japan and Taiwan), and the two main external actors, the United States and Soviet Union/Russia who played a key role influencing the region’s international relations. East Asia presents fascinating case studies in the study of international relations by bringing together the world’s three largest economies (US, China, Japan), three of the UN Security Council’s permanent members (US, Russia, China) and two divided nations (China/Taiwan and the two Korea).

The amended module focuses on major concepts, theories, methodologies and academic approaches to the study of nationalism, national identity and nationhood. It begins with an examination of the historical contexts and socioeconomic conditions under which nationalism emerged in the West and subsequently spread across the globe. By familiarising students with the key concepts, theories and approaches to the study of nationalism, the module aims at enabling students to understand the processes which appear to make nationalism a powerful mobilizing and homogenising force and also point to its contingent, shifting and fluid nature. The module focuses on understanding the political contestations underlying the notion of nationalism in various regional contexts

This module will introduce students to contemporary political theory through a focus on key concepts. These include liberty, rights, justice, democracy, representation, power, hegemony and secularism.

This second year undergraduate class will focus on the variety of ways in which performance is enacted in politics, broadly construed. It will augment more conventional approaches to politics by demonstrating the ways in which performance either attempts to soften and legitimise or conversely challenge and subvert institutions, interests, and power.

This module introduces electoral and party politics in modern democracies. It will involve the discussion of a wide range of theoretical approaches to the study of parties and elections and assess their applicability to non-western cases.

This module serves as an introduction to the politics of Egypt, the Arab East (Mashriq) including the Gulf and the Arabian Peninsula, Israel, Turkey and Iran. On a country-by-country basis, it gives an overview of the major political issues, forces and developments in the region since the end of the First World War, providing an analysis of the wider political contexts in which they occurred.

This module focuses on the domestic politics of sub-Saharan Africa since Independence and particularly the question of the state. Because of the sheer number and diversity of African states the module is structured thematically but the readings allow students to follow up regions and countries of particular interest.

This module will impart a solid grounding in the dynamic evolution of the Chinese state and Chinese nationalism, China's self-identified problems of weakness and underdevelopment, the difficult choices made by political elites over the course of three quite different regimes of the 20th and 21st century. Throughout the academic year, this module will stress how this legacy offers both the opportunity and constraint for the present politics of China.

This course is designed to provide students with a broad introduction to the historical and sociological factors that contribute to politics in South Asia. The course takes a country-specific and a comparative approach, It focuses on comparisons between states around South Asia, particularly, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and (time permitting) Bhutan and the Maldives. On several occasions, we examine these countries from a comparative perspective that also includes India.

This course is designed to provide students with a broad introduction to the conceptual, historical, and sociological factors that contribute to democracy and authoritarianism in India. While India is the main focus for building in-depth knowledge and within-country comparisons, the course places Indian cases in comparative frames with a range of countries within and beyond South Asia. Throughout, the emphasis is placed on analyses of political processes rather than a description of events. At the end of the course, students should have a good understanding of academic work on the South Asia and an ability to write well-structured and well-researched papers on selected subjects in the field.

In this module we will examine forms of global governance across a range of issue areas – including security, human rights, migration, and humanitarianism. Students will be asked to critically examine how power and hierarchy is being made and remade through the idea of global governance.

This module provides students with the relevant tools to undetake a critical study of Palestinian and Israeli politics in both a regional and international context. In the first part we focus on the emergence of Zionism, the impact of the British Mandate peirod, the Arab revolt of 1936-39 and the regional / international context of the 1947-49 and 1967 wars. In the second half we shift to the contemporary period to critically analyse the Oslo Accords, 2nd Intifada and international activism. We will also engage music, novels, poetry, and film related to the subject for a more nuanced understanding of concepts like nationalism, settler-colonialism, militarism, and collective memory.

. This course will chart the dominant features of this scholarly territory by familiarizing students with major issues and controversies in immigration research and by examining empirical cases in Africa, the GCC, and East Asia.

This module critically explores the international politics of 'security'. Its starting point is the recognition that the meaning of security - including whose security we are (or should be) talking about and what threatens this security - cannot be taken for granted. This has not only generated heated debates among scholars, but also shifted attention towards how political actors talk about 'security' and justify actions in its name. Positioned within this critical strand, this module addresses the contested nature of 'security' and provides students with the conceptual tools to see and analyse various empirical sites and practices of 'securitization'.

This module offers an advanced introduction to the politics of global environmental change. It focuses on problems of environmental transformation in the context of international power relations, the expansion of capitalism, and socio-political pressures for radical change.

This is a unique undergraduate module focusing on Taiwan’s relations with China and its international politics. Against the background of the island’s international relations during the period of the Cold War, lectures will explore Taiwan’s search for international space since the 1970s, as well as the evolution of cross-Strait relations under the administrations of Chen Shui-bian (2000-08), Ma Ying-jeou (2008 to 2016), and the newly-elected DPP president Tsai Ing-wen.

Decolonisation was a set of historical processes that radically transformed international politics in practice and thought. The emergence of a world of sovereign states - a core premise for International Relations - is founded on the assumed completion of such processes. Yet increasingly, research in the field points to a number of ongoing theoretical, methodological and practical issues that result from the colonial and post-colonial constitution of global order. This module asks what it means to 'decolonise International Relations' by engaging with the challenges posed by anti-colonial, post-colonial and de-colonial thinkers on such issues. We will do so by critically examining the complexity and diversity of anti-colonial movements and thinkers, mainly in Anglophone contexts. We will study colonialism and anti-colonialism as international and transnational in thought and practice by exploring how both the colonised and the coloniser were transformed by decolonisation. We will also consider the contemporary relevance of decolonisation by looking at the condition of postcolonialism. In addition we will examine the intersections between 'race', gender and class.

The aim of this module is to provide students with a critical introduction to the subfield of foreign policy analysis (FPA). The general theme of the module might be summarised as ‘from foreign policy to state action’.

This course introduces third year students in Politics degrees to diverse debates in gender and politics. Developed through a thematic, transnational approach, the module invites students to engage with majority world thinking on thematic questions and situate these intellectual debates within contemporary gender concerns

This is a unique undergraduate module focusing on Taiwan’s domestic politics. After an overview of Taiwan’s experience of authoritarian rule and democratic transition, the module has three main themes: Taiwan’s electoral and party politics, contested gender politics, and social movements.

The purpose of this module is to examine the effects of political factors on economic and social transformation (and vice versa) with reference to some of the most successful developing economies. It focuses on two main issues. First, how did political factors (i.e. types of regime and the conditions of their formation) facilitate the transformation of certain developing economies towards upper middle-income status during the GATT or pre-globalization era (c. 1950-90). Second, the module will examine how upper middle income economies are facing up to the challenges of the globalization era, notably mobile capital (financialization and the emergence of global value chains) and the complex of constraints that constitute the “middle income trap”.

This course will familiarise students with debates on republicanism and revolution in both early modern western thinking and 19th to 20th century anti-colonial thinking. The course will focus on the ‘republican revival’ in western political thought of the 1960s to 80s that occurred in the context of decolonization and postcolonial republican foundings. It will examine the language of political activism and anti-colonial revolution and consider how this language constitutes republican theory both in the western canon and anti-colonial backlash against imperial domination.

The Final Year Project allows students to develop an independent research and writing project on an approved topic and supervised by a member of academic staff in the Department.

This course introduces International Relations students to a wide range of issues in the contemporary world centred on conflict and the liberal world order. We look historically at the decline of inter-state war and the rise (and now decline) of civil wars, and at the rise of global terrorism and its implications, focusing on efforts to combat both the occurrence and conduct of conflict through international law and norms with a particular focus on the politics of human rights, international justice and humanitarianism. We look more specifically at the protection of civilians, torture, civil liberties, cyber warfare and drones, and the Responsibility to Protect. We also ask whether the rise of populism might erode the willingness of Western democracies to support, in principle at least, international norms and at the implications of this both for the liberal world order as a whole and the globalisation of democracy in particular.

This final year module provides a philosophical and empirical introduction to contemporary debates regarding the compatibility of Islam and democracy. It also encourages a critical re-examination of these debates through: a discussion of Muslim scholarship (and practice) pertaining to the specification and interpretation of Islamic law, the role of religious and political opposition, and the status of the individual in political and social life, as well as a careful recapitulation of these debates in the context of well-known texts prepared by non-Muslim democratic theorists, all of whom have addressed the meaning of “law,” the role of “opposition,” and the political status of the “individual” (as well as the relationship between religion and politics in general) in some detail.

This course introduces third year students in Politics degrees to diverse debates in gender and politics. Developed through a thematic, transnational approach, the module invites students to engage with majority world thinking on thematic questions and situate these intellectual debates within contemporary gender concerns

The course shall examine debates in the discipline of politics about the role of “culture” in politics – as practices of meaning-making in politics; as a series of everyday practices and rituals with implicit (or overt) political content; and as cultural products (art, films, etc.) both whose making and content reflects a specific politics. To do so, the course will require three activities outside class: A visit to the British Museum – as the basis of discussing Orientalism, but also Nationalism and empire in the politics of archaeology and artistic accumulation A visit to a diasporic enclave in London – as the basis of a discussion of questions of identity-making, immigration, and the political economy of “cultural” practices (restaurants, specific shops catering to specific communities, etc.)

This is a unique undergraduate module focusing on Taiwan’s domestic politics. After an overview of Taiwan’s experience of authoritarian rule and democratic transition, the module has three main themes: Taiwan’s electoral and party politics, contested gender politics, and social movements.

The purpose of this module is to examine the effects of political factors on economic and social transformation (and vice versa) with reference to some of the most successful developing economies. It focuses on two main issues. First, how did political factors (i.e. types of regime and the conditions of their formation) facilitate the transformation of certain developing economies towards upper middle-income status during the GATT or pre-globalization era (c. 1950-90). Second, the module will examine how upper middle income economies are facing up to the challenges of the globalization era, notably mobile capital (financialization and the emergence of global value chains) and the complex of constraints that constitute the “middle income trap”.

This course will familiarise students with debates on republicanism and revolution in both early modern western thinking and 19th to 20th century anti-colonial thinking. The course will focus on the ‘republican revival’ in western political thought of the 1960s to 80s that occurred in the context of decolonization and postcolonial republican foundings. It will examine the language of political activism and anti-colonial revolution and consider how this language constitutes republican theory both in the western canon and anti-colonial backlash against imperial domination.

In what ways have revolutions, uprisings and popular mobilizations shaped everyday life and the modern state in the Middle East? This module will address this question by examining the politics, processes, fortunes, and cultural production of revolutions and uprisings in the Middle East in the contemporary period. The module begins with a focus on the anti-colonial movements, leading up to and including the Arab Uprisings (1st and 2nd waves). Drawing on works on Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Oman, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Sudan and Yemen we will situate our discussions in the context of theoretical studies of resistance, hegemony, and domination.

This final year module provides a philosophical and empirical introduction to contemporary debates regarding the compatibility of Islam and democracy. It also encourages a critical re-examination of these debates through: a discussion of Muslim scholarship (and practice) pertaining to the specification and interpretation of Islamic law, the role of religious and political opposition, and the status of the individual in political and social life, as well as a careful recapitulation of these debates in the context of well-known texts prepared by non-Muslim democratic theorists, all of whom have addressed the meaning of “law,” the role of “opposition,” and the political status of the “individual” (as well as the relationship between religion and politics in general) in some detail.

This course introduces International Relations students to a wide range of issues in the contemporary world centred on conflict and the liberal world order. We look historically at the decline of inter-state war and the rise (and now decline) of civil wars, and at the rise of global terrorism and its implications, focusing on efforts to combat both the occurrence and conduct of conflict through international law and norms with a particular focus on the politics of human rights, international justice and humanitarianism. We look more specifically at the protection of civilians, torture, civil liberties, cyber warfare and drones, and the Responsibility to Protect. We also ask whether the rise of populism might erode the willingness of Western democracies to support, in principle at least, international norms and at the implications of this both for the liberal world order as a whole and the globalisation of democracy in particular.

This module examines the relationship between the production of scientific knowledge and technology and political projects in the Global South. It investigates how the struggle over power transforms and is itself transformed by science as modern and contemporary regimes worked to “master” non-human and human nature (and bodies) in the Global South.

In this module we will examine forms of global governance across a range of issue areas – including security, human rights, migration, and humanitarianism. Students will be asked to critically examine how power and hierarchy is being made and remade through the idea of global governance.

This module provides students with the relevant tools to undetake a critical study of Palestinian and Israeli politics in both a regional and international context. In the first part we focus on the emergence of Zionism, the impact of the British Mandate peirod, the Arab revolt of 1936-39 and the regional / international context of the 1947-49 and 1967 wars. In the second half we shift to the contemporary period to critically analyse the Oslo Accords, 2nd Intifada and international activism. We will also engage music, novels, poetry, and film related to the subject for a more nuanced understanding of concepts like nationalism, settler-colonialism, militarism, and collective memory.

. This course will chart the dominant features of this scholarly territory by familiarizing students with major issues and controversies in immigration research and by examining empirical cases in Africa, the GCC, and East Asia.

This module critically explores the international politics of 'security'. Its starting point is the recognition that the meaning of security - including whose security we are (or should be) talking about and what threatens this security - cannot be taken for granted. This has not only generated heated debates among scholars, but also shifted attention towards how political actors talk about 'security' and justify actions in its name. Positioned within this critical strand, this module addresses the contested nature of 'security' and provides students with the conceptual tools to see and analyse various empirical sites and practices of 'securitization'.

This module offers an advanced introduction to the politics of global environmental change. It focuses on problems of environmental transformation in the context of international power relations, the expansion of capitalism, and socio-political pressures for radical change.

This is a unique undergraduate module focusing on Taiwan’s relations with China and its international politics. Against the background of the island’s international relations during the period of the Cold War, lectures will explore Taiwan’s search for international space since the 1970s, as well as the evolution of cross-Strait relations under the administrations of Chen Shui-bian (2000-08), Ma Ying-jeou (2008 to 2016), and the newly-elected DPP president Tsai Ing-wen.

The Final Year Project allows students to develop an independent research and writing project on an approved topic and supervised by a member of academic staff in the Department.

The aim of this module is to provide students with a critical introduction to the subfield of foreign policy analysis (FPA). The general theme of the module might be summarised as ‘from foreign policy to state action’.