Sciences Po Reims

This course focuses on the French art of strolling aimlessly through the city from the late 19th century to present. Exploring the intersection between the city walker and the urban environments navigated on foot, this course provides a unique perspective on the role of public space in the construction of urban modernity in France. The course adopts an explicitly class-, race-, and gender-critical approach to the study of this able-bodied practice that has traditionally been associated with a certain Baudelairean archetype of bourgeois masculinity. The course investigates who has the right to linger and be seen in public space, how the act of strolling aimlessly through the city intersects with other forms of societal privilege, and when and where wandering becomes a means of protest or resistance. By tracing the itineraries and embodied geographies that are traversed in this practice, this course creates a map of social mobility and urban modernity in the ever-evolving French city.

This course focuses on understanding the relationship between terrorism and urban space. It traces the impact of terrorist attacks on cities and urban, cultural, political, religious, public, and economic areas in the strategies of terrorist organizations. The course discusses the method of terrorism to manipulate and change urban spaces and the counter-terrorism strategies and policies aimed at rehabilitating the damage. Three cities will be the primary examples in this course, among others: New York, Paris, and Mosul. The course provides an introduction to global digital governance and highlights the importance of understanding how internet technology functions, is evolving, and being governed. It examines how the digitization of the world is impacting our societies and economies, and what rules this trend may imply.

This course examines current environmental and climate change movements in Europe and the United States, including their background and their significance. At the same time, it utilizes these movements as a lens to understand the politics of climate change and social movements more generally. Specifically, this course investigates the main political ideas driving environmental and climate activism; analyzes the main features, forms, developments, and challenges of environmental and climate activism; discerns their impact and relevance in sustainability politics today; and introduces an understanding of social movements as key drivers of social change. The course provides a thorough understanding of climate and environmental activism: its origins, pathways, and diversity, as well as its relevance for sustainability politics in general. Through an interdisciplinary approach that draws on research and theories of social movement studies and environmental politics from several of the social sciences, there is an empirical focus on Europe and the United States, as well as links with other continents and global politics.

This course focuses on the early centuries of both Islam and Christianity which involved an intensive confrontation with Greek philosophy and often led to the emergence of rival sects and theological schools. The first part of this course covers the history of the emergence of these different approaches and the philosophy and theology implied by each, with a special focus on the branches of Islam. The second part of the course traces the history of these branches up to the present day, looking at them particularly in light of the advent of liberalism in the West with its separation of the public and private spheres; the cultural dynamics that emerged from colonialism, imperialism, and also decolonization; and finally, globalization and the resurgence of political theologies that seem to reject the modern idea of the nation-state.