Sciences Po Reims

This course considers how the global pandemic of 2020-2021 has challenged the modus operandi, urban development model, and financial viability of the world's great cities at a time when those also have to face the profound challenge of making themselves more resilient against the multi-faceted threat of climate change. It highlights both the danger and opportunity brought on by the pandemic, in terms of rethinking transport systems, commercial real estate, commuting and work arrangements, food distribution, energy, waste management and recycling, housing policy, education, and the provision of essential business as well as personal services. The course examines the shake up of “established wisdom” in urban economics which has led to new thinking and an opening for innovation that extends to new organizational formations within the context of the “circular economy,” as well as “social solidarity economy” such as urban commons and cooperatives.

This course introduces the study of educational inequality and education policy. It begins by reviewing the main goals, achievements, and outstanding challenges in education policy at the beginning of the 21st century. Specifically, it takes a historical perspective to review the progress made with respect to providing education to large parts of the world's population and with respect to reducing gender inequality in education. The course then turns to one key policy challenge of the early 21st century: reducing the inequalities in education between individuals from different socio-economic backgrounds. It examines the social processes that may account for these educational inequalities and discusses whether and how different policies can address them.

This course introduces a set of analytic tools and conceptual frameworks through which to assess the origins and evolution of the institutions that constitute modern capitalism. It takes an interdisciplinary political economy approach that draws insights from economics, sociology, political science, history, geography, science and technology studies, and law. The course critically assesses the rise of what Karl Polanyi and Albert O. Hirschman have referred to as "market society," a powerful conceptual framework that views the development of modern capitalism not as an outcome of deterministic economic and technological forces, but rather as the result of contingent social and political processes. The material covers various theoretical perspectives that illustrate alternative conceptions of rationality, which in turn produce competing ways of seeing and making sense of the complexities of our social world. Ultimately, the course exposes a range of critical conceptual tools and frameworks through which to interrogate the current relationship between states and markets, and to consider the extent to which social actors can challenge its limits and imagine alternative possibilities.

This course covers the role of revolutions in shaping history. From the Cold War, to the “new world order” following the end of the Cold War, to the present day, the course considers how and why revolutions happen, what constitutes a revolution, and how revolutions achieve (or fail to achieve) social and political reform.

This course focuses on the political aspects of Hollywood cinema by questioning the links that exist between the production of films and the ideological structures hidden behind the images. It discusses how genre cinema appears to be a "dream factory" whose specific economic organization is accompanied by ideological and political schemes that should be identified in the perspective of political and cultural studies. The course demonstrates how much cinema contributes to the diffusion of the traditional values of the American Dream and how the big studios manage to find a balance between submission to the commercial constraints imposed by the market, simplification of political phenomena (whether situational or systemic), and artistic research.

This interdisciplinary course explores classic literature and contemporary perspectives on reproduction from the perspectives of history, sociology, anthropology, and law. It examines the crucial role reproduction plays in how relations between nations are negotiated, both symbolically and materially. From colonial to metropolitan households, notably via military contexts, the “domestic” has been re-signified by the transnational: nannies, international adoption, and gestational surrogacy have historical links with 19th and 20th centuries' wars. Focusing on the exchanges and connections between the economic, the political, and the intimate, it examines how these increasingly global processes affect individuals, families, and (imagined) communities from multiple lenses: ethnicity and race, nation, class, and gender. It considers how notions of kinship, citizenship, and human rights have become the subject of intense scrutiny, notably through public debates on private and state management of collective life through (bio)technologies of measurement and intervention. Case studies range from analysis of gender dynamics of armed rebellions in Africa to reproductive politics in the United States. Key concepts and policies pertaining to biopolitics, birthing, welfare programs, domestic labor, marriage, and care work are discussed.

This course is structured as a series of workshops focusing on Russia's influence in Europe, nearby countries, and the United States. It approaches this topic with the perspectives of popular geopolitics, international relations theory, cultural studies, media studies, and sociology. Topics include strategies of Kremlin's propaganda; its (post)-Cold-War-era anti-Americanism reverberating in the rhetoric of the European far-rights; Russia's Covid-19 policy; Putin's troll fabrics; interference in the U.S. elections; the Russian Orthodox Church and the Kremlin's influence in Ukraine and Georgia; and Russia's invasion on Ukraine. The course is based on case studies and extensively uses audio and video materials, documentaries, political statements, investigative reports, and opinion surveys as sources for analysis.

This class presents the main principles of international political economy, also known as global political economy, which studies globalization and the reciprocal interaction between international relations, economics, and politics. Gathering knowledge from history, international relations, politics, economics, and sociology in an innovative way, the course provides a broad overview of the frameworks of analysis, actors, institutions, issues, and processes responsible for international relations, the causes of war, inter-state economic competition, and the structural configuration of power in the global context. It analyzes global affairs from a three-dimensional perspective: statist logic, market logic, and institutional logic. The course relies on readings, class debates, and the study of factual cases to develop academic skills and apply these skills for professional outcomes. 

This course covers the political history of Europe from the second half of the 19th century to the first half of the 20th century. It reflects on the first half of the 19th century, when the great powers agreed to maintain the order established by the Congress of Vienna in Europe and to defeat the national movements. It then explores how liberalism and democracy experienced an important development in the second half of the 19th century when the achievement of Italian and German unity responded to the failures of 1848, in a Europe where, except for France and the United Kingdom, democracy did not progress. Until 1914, authoritarian regimes were numerous and quite powerful. Finally, it discusses the aftermath of the Great War when Europe was confronted with a new phenomenon, that of a fascist wave that affected both Eastern and Southern Europe.

This course focuses on the history of racial health and medicine in the United States. It provides a broad overview of issues related to medical racism in the United States from the colonial period to the present. While issues of discrimination and medical experimentation are addressed extensively throughout the semester, the course also considers the question of medical research, political mobilizations, and the institutional aspects of public health.