Institut d'Etudes Politiques (Sciences Po)

This course examines the role of popular distrust (e.g., perceptions of government corruption, waste, abuse) in contemporary democratic and electoral-authoritarian regimes. It probes contradictions in how scholars approach distrust within democracy. It explores how distrust gets politicized and interacts with institutions and inequalities to drive participation and political violence; reactions to public spending, taxation, public-health risk and conspiracy theories; and voting behavior among groups who feel threatened (economically, culturally). By foregrounding questions of power and state capacity—and what remains of them—in the minds of voters facing new social risks, this course offers a path to harness the mobilizing force of distrust within a neo-republican framework.

This course explores the formation and development of educational thought throughout Western history. It analyzes the influence that the rise of modern democracy - and the social, philosophical, and political transformations it entailed - had on our vision of education. As the Church's authority gradually declined in the eighteenth century with the emergence of Enlightenment ideas, new ways of thinking about the role of the state and the purpose of education emerged. Education became increasingly tied to political life and was seen as a central element for the development and stability of modern democratic societies. A central theme throughout the course, therefore, concerns the political function of education: Who should control education? Why should the state intervene? For whom is it intended? The course studies the way various thinkers have thought about the purpose of education, whether it is to shape moral character, to prepare citizens for civic life, to train workers for economic productivity or to foster personal emancipation and freedom. By studying the long and complex history of educational thought in its political and social contexts, this course offers an invaluable training for thinking critically and flexibly about the political challenges of our own time.

This course covers advanced theories of International Relations. The course explores central questions of international politics by examining the different traditions of thought about the character and nature of "the international." The course goes beyond realist and liberal theories to explore a counter-history of the theory on international politics and covers topics such as Marxism, feminism, post-colonialism, international political sociology, migration, environmental studies, and critical approaches to the international order and its institutional structures. The course examines how "the international" was constructed as a field of study throughout capitalist modernity, and how these theories are connected to the practice of international relations. It ends by relating international theory to contemporary events, such as the global war on terror and the rise of the far-right.

In addition to knowledge of the subjects explored by cultural history and political ideas over the past 25 years, this course introduces the reading and understanding of texts that have shaped European political culture. It also discusses the structures that shape mass culture.

The majority of lectures in political psychology focus on the American context. This course thinks outside the box and shifts attention to the intersection of politics and psychology in a comparative manner, while still keeping the U.S. case in mind. The course begins by reviewing the foundations of political psychology and then explores the current state of the field. Next, it delves into how individuals make decisions, the mechanisms used in information processing, the importance of both "cold" and "hot" cognition in forming political behavior, and the role of groups and identities in shaping political opinions. Lastly, the course concludes by examining the relationships between groups and exploring why polarization is becoming increasingly prevalent in present-day politics.

This course is for students at advanced levels C1+ (with at least two semesters completed in C1) and C2. It focuses on improving linguistic tools for oral expression. The course promotes, consolidates, and perfects oral practice in Spanish based on specific cases and situations. To this end, a series of activities are carried out to develop this communicative competence. It enhances fluency, grammatical and lexical correctness, semantic precision, and pronunciation, all while taking into account the needs and expectations of the students. The basics of discourse analysis are used and the uses and strategies of debate are promoted. Each oral expression process is adapted to the context of speech (registers and context).

Utilizing both academic research and literary/artistic expression, this course contributes towards gaining critical and dynamic analytical perspectives on urban transformations in the Arab region, especially in newly formed cities-turned-capitals like Amman and Kuwait. The course visits precolonial societies in the region, their precolonial interactions and modes of communal existence, and then considers the effects of colonialism, border-drawing, and postcolonial identity construction and its enduring effects in modern cities whose inhabitants go through various degrees of identity questioning, alienation, and conflict. The course also looks at the effects of authoritarianism, neoliberalism, commodification, and self-centered consumerism on urban transformations and malformations.

This advanced course guides students through key contemporary sociological debates, presenting major theoretical and analytical paradigms and exploring how these are developed and tested through empirical research. The course tackles complex questions about inequality, justice, emotion, creativity, violence and belief, highlighting the tension between micro-, meso- and macro-level explanations. Students also discover how sociology is practiced across different countries and intellectual traditions, gaining comparative insights and deeper reflexivity about their own place in society.

This course provides fundamental knowledge and critical understanding of the intricate relationship between international law and global politics, with a particular emphasis on the processes of political globalization. While the prominence of nation-states on the global stage appears to be waning, political globalization is characterized by the increasing role of intergovernmental organizations and elements of global civil society such as international NGOs, and social movement organizations. As key concepts of global politics such as power, equality, sustainability, and peace are now being challenged by this process, the course explores how legal frameworks and political dynamics interact on the global stage. To this end, it covers theoretical foundations, key actors, sources of international law, and contemporary issues, with a focus on practical implications and case studies.

This course studies the relationship between energy and urbanization, taking a global approach that gives pride of place to cities in the Global South and emphasizing a socio-material perspective and an understanding of the social practices and hierarchies that structure cities. Furthermore, energy governance is a major issue in urban policy today, particularly in the context of ecological transition. Therefore, it studies urban energy, taking into account the long term and also looking ahead to the future. In terms of methodology, the course is rooted in geography. It uses and familiarize students with certain geographical methods such as cartography and graphic visualization. It also encourages students to engage directly and critically with social science works in the form of articles and books, leading to presentations and lectures, as well as a graded written assignment.