University of Bologna

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor. This course focuses on the following topics:

1. Market failures in health insurance: a) Adverse selection b) Moral hazard c) Other inefficiencies
2. Economic rationales for government intervention and redistribution
3. Insurance design and payment systems
4. Regulatory intervention and the public/private mix in health insurance
5. Comparative social insurance markets

At the end of the module, students: have knowledge of law and economics theories applied to insurance and social insurance markets and have insights on national, international, and comparative case studies; know how to utilize quantitative and qualitative information to analyze the impact of regulatory instruments on the efficiency of insurance and social insurance markets design, and critically develop proposals for optimal policy design.

The course provides students with the fundamental coordinates of modern political conceptuality (individual, the State, conflict, freedom, people, representation, etc.). The lessons focus on a series of classic authors of the history of political thought, addressed in their specific characters and supported by the reading and commentary of texts in the classroom. The course follows a monographic red thread - the birth and (presumed) end of modern political conceptuality - and does not claim to cover the entire history of political thought. Fundamental authors live in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, just as essential foundations are laid by ancient and medieval thought. The purpose of this monographic choice is to investigate those passages that best allow the questioning and exposition of the implicit assumptions of our contemporary political life. In particular, two key moments are analyzed: the birth of modern political conceptuality (16th-17th centuries), and the point of greatest tension of this conceptual apparatus in the XXth century. In outlining its fundamental passages, we constantly wonder about the persistence or the crisis of this conceptual apparatus in our contemporaneity: how modern is the implicit assumptions of our political action? What contemporary transformations have instead radically changed the scenario? How have the relationships between society, the State and market changed historically? Are there constants of human action and is it possible to study them?

At the end of the course, students: know the fundamental features of the modern and contemporary History of Political Thought; know the main forms of political communication and understand the complex relationships between ideas and facts; know the most important political doctrines and are able to critically analyze them in connection with the relevant cultural, institutional, historical and social context; are able to understand the most important political and institutional changes in Western history.

The course provides advanced knowledge to the archaeology of Mesopotamia, Syria-Palestine, and Anatolia. It focuses on civilizations and artistic cultures of Mesopotamia, Syria-Palestine, and Anatolia during the Bronze and Iron ages. Students learn the methodologies and the perspectives of near eastern archaeology and art history. They learn to recognize and critically examine archaeological and visual materials, to characterize material culture, and acquire the necessary tools for framing data within their chronological, historical and political framework.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor. In Spring 2025, the main topic of this course was Soul and Body: Metaphysics of the Person in Plato and Aristotle. The aim of the course is to verify these attributions through the “slow reading” of an anthology of passages taken from the works of the two Greek philosophers, also in light of the most recent critical literature on this topic.

At the end of the course the student has acquired (1) the in-depth knowledge of a philosophical topic or problem typical of Greek and Roman antiquity and (2) three types of skills: (a) philological – he/she knows how to analyze an ancient text using the advanced philological tools needed for the study of Greek and Roman philosophy; (b) dialectical – he/she is trained to discuss a philosophical problem in a synchronic and diachronic way, through the comparison between ancient and modern philosophers; (c) rhetorical – he/she is capable of arguing exegetical and philosophical theses in oral and written form.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor. This course is also taught under the title 'International Law and Sustainability'

The course addresses the following topics:

• The “what”, “who” and “where” of contemporary international environmental law:
  • What does international environmental law deal with?
  • Who makes international environmental law?
  • Where is international environmental law made and where is it applied?
• The origins and evolution of international environmental law;
• The sources of international environmental law;
• The institutional contexts (MEAs);
• Accountability, liability, responsibility and dispute settlement;
• Interactions with other bodies of international law, with special regard to international human rights law, international economic law and the laws of warfare.

Throughout the course, the law governing the utilization of transboundary water resources is given special attention in order to show the practical functioning of international environmental law. Other specific substantive areas of international environmental law will be illustrated, with special regard to the marine environment, biodiversity and the fight against climate change. At the end of the course, students will have acquired: The international origin and basis of rules and principles of domestic environmental law; The content of rules and principles on the international protection of the environment; The sources of international environmental law; The interactions between international environmental law and other branches of international law, eg human rights law and investment law; How to develop a research on international environmental law.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrolment is by permission of the instructor. The course analyzes the development of the photographic language, from its origins in the 19th century to recent experiences, focusing on artistic practices and those of the cultural and creative industries. Special attention is paid to exhibitions, both public and private, and their capacity to help the photographic language change its meanings and identities. Following a theoretical and historical approach, classes explore artistic poetics, creative ideas, and curatorial choices from an aesthetic point of view, reading photography as a social, political, and communicative issue. Several historical exhibitions are analyzed as case histories of the development of curatorial language and photographic display.

Students acquire the fundamental historical and theoretical knowledge that puts photography at the heart of artistic practices and of the cultural and creative industry. In particular, they develop methodological tools and interpretative skills useful to recognize the styles and poetics of the photographic display. They are also able to analyze and comment on display types with critical awareness.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor. The program focuses on the protection of healthcare in the European Union and most notably covers the following topics:

• the major constitutional and political issues underlying this subject;
• the competences of the EU in the field of healthcare and the increasing role of the One Health approach in the EU;
• healthcare as an economic freedom;
• healthcare as a fundamental right;
• healthcare as a sectoral policy of the European Union: governance, institutional actors and regulatory framework;
• the case law of the Court of Justice on health services and access to cross-border healthcare; the pharmaceutical and medical devices market;
• the digitization of healthcare systems (e.g., e-Health, m-Health, Artificial Intelligence, and European Health Data Space);
• preparedness and response planning in the event of serious cross-border health threats: the Union’s response to COVID-19.

At the end of the course unit, students: possess an in-depth knowledge about the supranational legal mechanisms concerning health, with an emphasis on patient mobility and the cooperation between Member States to face transboundary health crises; can figure out (and solve) problems affecting the transboundary development of health policies at the European level, especially the provision of health services, and are capable to assess the abovementioned mechanisms in the framework of the applicable international legal regime, in particular the World Health Organization.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor. International Security (a.k.a Strategic Studies) is an established field within the International Relations discipline, focusing on the role and functions of military forces in international politics. More specifically, the course covers both theory and practice of war and warfare, with emphasis on the contemporary era. It is subdivided into two sections (of different lengths). The first part ("Strategic Theory", shorter) examines some of the principal "theories of war" (e.g. Sun Tzu & Clausewitz ). The first part provides the participants with the relevant analytics tools to attend the second part ("the Tools of Warfare"), which is devoted to the application of those theories to modern warfare as well as an examination of the principal military doctrines, the weapons of mass destructions and irregular warfare (insurgencies, guerrilla and terrorism).

By the end of the course, students are able to: 1) Appreciate variation in conceptions of international security theories. 2) Understand the origins and evolution of mainstream theories on military strategy. 3) Understand the significance of alternative conceptions of national security for states' policies. 4) Develop an understanding of the capabilities and limitations of modern warfare in strategic international events. 5) Develop analytical skills to be applied to international security issues.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor. This course is meant to provide theoretical concepts and managerial tools to (a) understand and analyze the main models underlying organizational behavior and people management; (b) develop and increase critical skills in decision making through the analysis of the impact of theories; c) identify problem solving approaches through discussion of case studies.

The course is divided into 3 parts: The Individual in Organizations; Group and Team Processes; Power, Politics and Conflicts.

At the end of the course, students: know the salient characteristics of individuals, work teams, and organizational processes that influence organizational performance in face-to-face and virtual work settings; are capable of analyzing risks and opportunities of different work designs, managing complex decision processes, and detecting and implementing strategies to solve organizational conflicts, particularly in globally distributed teams.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrolment is by permission of the instructor. The course is divided into 2 modules. Module 1 builds on empirical analysis from current diplomatic practices, and module 2 is a historiographic-based course. 

The program for module 1 is as follows:
1.  The evolution of the functions of the professional diplomat;
2.  Bilateral relations: construction of privileged partnerships;
3.  When a dispute freezes the bilateral relationship: the case of the Italian Marines;
4.  Multilateralism today;
5. Conflicts, prevention, the fragmented world in which we live;
6. The consular function: at the service of Italians abroad;
7.  Economic diplomacy: the new functions of public support for internationalization;
8. Economic diplomacy: the Farnesina as an "Agency" for the promotion of our Country. Nation Branding and integrated promotion;
9. Economic diplomacy: the path from export to internationalization that many companies still have to complete and some to consolidate;
10. A glance to the future: the role of the professional diplomat in the years to come.

Module 2 focuses on the interplay between diplomacy and international economic relations from a historiographic point of view. It covers a period that spans from the immediate aftermath of WWII to the early XXIst century. This module explores a set of case studies that pertain to the diplomatic, economic, and political transformations of the international system as it emerged since the start of the Cold War. Classes are organized as follows:
1. XX century diplomacy;
2. Bilateral relations.;
3. Diplomatic discords;
4. The origins of multilateralism;
5. Failed agreements;
6. Migrations and diplomacy;
7. The history of the European Economic Community (I);
8. The history of the European Economic Community (II);
9. The web of international economic organization between the Cold War and the early-post Cold War era;
10. Diplomatic and economic challenges in the early XXI century.