France

This is a highly interactive elective seminar course encouraging maximum student participation and leadership. Grounded in the concept of praxis (learning by doing, education for use), the course explores the nature of influence, legitimate and non-coercive methods of influence, and different ways of exercising that influence. Ranging from the academic and philosophical to the practical and personal, the course considers forms, methods, and networks of influence, weighs questions related to messaging, visibility, and the power of example, as well as offering training on how to give a successful speech, how to go on television with no time to prepare, how to exercise influence in organizations, and how to create your own persona as an influencer.

This course establishes fundamental knowledge needed to understand contemporary Iran. It analyzes political, economic, and cultural transformations which have guided imperial Persia from the beginning of the 19th century to become the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979. The course systematically compares Iran and its regional environment with an emphasis on the Arab world and Turkey. It utilizes diverse disciplinary approaches, from social history to political economics, with a focus on political sociology.

This course taught in Spanish explores political thought through a Latin American lens. The course begins with indigenous primary sources and their views on the Conquista and maintains those indigenous viewpoints through different eras in Latin American history. The course focuses primarily on the indigenous role, post-colonial impacts, and contemporary Latin America.

This course studies democratic transitions. Looking both at classical readings as well as cutting edge literature, it explores five aspects of democratization: its conditions (do societies need to be wealthy?), its endogenous dynamics (what types of regime and opposition favor a transition?), its exogenous dynamics (how does the international economy or geopolitics influence transitions?), different pathways (rupture or reform), and their legacy. These five aspects are explored throughout the course as it examines an array of case studies from different waves of democratization. It provides a comprehensive understanding of democratic transitions from an economic, social, and political lens. Drawing on a wide range of case studies, the course grapples with traditional theories of democratization both empirically and theoretically.

This course explores the relationship between urbanization and globalization and considers global urbanization based on the discipline of geography and its tools. After providing conceptual bases for thinking and representing the urban, the course explores the spaces and forms of urban societies, as well as the practices and social dynamics that define urbanity. It then studies the logic of interconnection between cities, particularly on the economic and migratory levels. Finally, the course focuses on the government of cities and their major development issues. It highlights differing urban realities on each continent, examining the diverse urbanity of the South in particular.