Political Science

This course examines Thailand through the perspective of its military experience from past to present. It introduces students to various aspects of Thailand within the realm of conflict from its military history to its strategic culture. As such, the course adopts a multidisciplinary approach, encouraging students to look at Thailand from a range of disciplines whether it is history, politics, or international relations. Though it may be helpful, no prior knowledge or experience will be assumed. Students are expected to develop the ability to manage and analyze potentially complex and challenging issues through the use of evidence and theories, and be able to communicate them in both oral and literary manner.

Rarely a day passes without the media reporting on violent uprisings, military coups, international interventions, suicide bombings, drone attacks, and civilian casualties all over the world. In conflict studies, these events are often discussed using a range of concepts such as ‘civil war’, ‘protracted social conflict’, ‘invasions’, and ’terrorism’. Despite this proliferation of terms, clarifying the complexity of violent conflict in the 21st century remains a challenging task. Rather than choosing one of these labels, this course presents a variety of theoretical approaches that aim to understand why and how different actors resort to violence in internationalized intrastate conflict. Each of these theories use different analytical categories to study different aspect of the phenomena under investigation. The course respectively focuses on the non-state, state, paramilitary, and international actor. This course teaches conflict analysis to help understand, and explain to others, the complex array of actors, interests, and dynamics involved in the violent conflicts we see around the world today. Throughout the course, address pressing issues in contemporary warfare like: How are terrorist and insurgency organizations able to mobilize people towards violent action? Why do states deploy starvation and sieges as a weapon of war in response?  Why do states outsource violence to paramilitaries? How and why do international actors forge transnational alliances to intervene in theatres of war? The course focuses on a broad range of contemporary case studies, such as Afghanistan, Israel-Palestine, Ukraine, Syria, Iraq, Ethiopia, and Nagorno-Karabakh. Collectively, grappling with these different layers of analysis in isolation and in relation to one another and different case studies sharpen your conceptual and analytical capacities greatly. This course is essential for those who plan to participate in upcoming courses of the Conflict Studies minor. Entrance requirements include at least 45 EC for the category 1 (Bachelor Introductory).

This course aims to build foundational knowledge of global policy frameworks, systematically introducing core concepts, historical evolution, and key actors (states, international organizations, NGOs, etc.) of global public policy. Combining contemporary issues such as climate change, global health, and digital governance, it cultivates students' basic capabilities to analyze transnational policy challenges and governance mechanisms through real-world cases like the Montreal Protocol and COVID-19 vaccine distribution. It also covers cutting-edge topics such as technological governance and regional integration to solidify the cognitive foundation of global governance.

This course examines some of the most significant issues facing the world today such as the recurrence of violence between and within countries; the difficulty of lifting large numbers of people out of poverty; what is to happen to people who do not have a home in any country; increasing environmental destruction; intensifying global financial instability; and whether the current structures and processes of governance are adequate to address these issues. 

Self-identified indigenous peoples inhabit all continents except Antarctica and struggle against oppressive inequality, ethnocidal assimilation and genocidal extermination by the settler societies, colonial/neocolonial/postcolonial developmental states and national populations that surround them.  Nevertheless, the local/global contexts of their struggles differ substantially.  What are the political consequences and effects of grouping together into a global category, for example, the Saami in Scandinavia, the Yanomami of Brazil, India’s adivasi, and Australian Aborigines?  This course will survey the global history of the discourse of indigeneity and some local political contexts of indigenous peoples.  The aim will be to try to understand relevant commonalities and also important differences among indigenous struggles across the world, though our primary focus will be on indigenous peoples in Brazil and Latin America.  Themes will include racism and ethnic discrimination, extractivism and clashes over large-scale economic development projects, human rights and international organizations, and political self-determination and the politics of state recognition.  As this semester coincides with COP30 in Belém, Brazil, we will spend some weeks on questions of eco-politics and indigenous participation in climate change negotiations. 

This course introduces and presents the authors and founding texts of contemporary thought; the latest works in social and political sciences, whether by philosophers, essayists, scientists, or today's key players: political decision-makers, tech innovators, and ideologists working behind the scenes to influence the world of tomorrow. All are pioneers of the most hotly debated theories. Our era is one of great ideological conflict. Antagonistic conceptions of what the future of our societies will or could look like are clashing. Each class session is an opportunity to address these disruptive ideas, which largely break down traditional categories. Four major themes bring together the most recent analyses and doctrines: new practices of power, ecological reflections that pit ideas of progress against those of degrowth in unprecedented terms, artificial intelligence as a threat or an opportunity for our societies, and finally, the questioning of traditional economic models that have always been taken for granted. A journey through the works of Peter Thiel, founder of PayPal and inspirer of Trumpism, to those of Giuliano da Empoli, the thinker behind the “new predators.” It is also be an opportunity to compare the ecological thinking of Jean-Marc Jancovici's Shift Project with Naomi Klein's radical ideas.

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 course provides students with a comprehensive understanding of the comparative dimension of the European legal space through primary institutions and principles, with a particular emphasis on solidarity. The course will lead the students to acquire and improve the following skills: techniques for reading and understanding constitutional norms, legislation and case law from different legal systems, as well as critical skills for the comparative examination of European constitutionalism; ability to find and understand legal sources of the European legal space; skills to elaborate innovative norms and policies in both the public and the private sector.

The course content is divided as follows:

• Comparative Methodology
• Practical and Theoretical Targets of Legal Comparison
• European Legal Families and Political/Territorial Systems
• European Constitutionalism and Comparative Understandings of the Principle of Solidarity
• EU and Domestic Legal Framework of Solidarity
• Solidarity in Inter-territorial relations
• Financial, Migration, and Environmental Norms and Policies on Solidarity
• Constitutional Adjudication and Interaction with European Courts

This course covers the key institutions, actors, and issues shaping Taiwan’s contemporary politics. The class introduces how Taiwan’s democracy operates, how it manages its complex relationship with China, and how it positions itself globally. The first half covers the structure and everyday workings of Taiwan’s political system, while the second half examines current political debates and challenges through weekly topics and guest speakers. Students gain a clear understanding of how Taiwan’s vibrant democracy functions and why it matters in today’s world.

This course examines the rise of human rights discourse and its relationship to other discourses on suffering and social justice. It focuses on the experience of victims of human rights abuse and the politics of meaning. Students will engage in critiques of law as a reductionist discourse on the social by exploring the relationships between human rights and cultural differences such as gender, ethnicity, religion and indigenous cultures. The embodied self, social interdependency and the architecture of social institutions are the backdrop through which the course explores the tensions between universal and relativist understandings of human rights and their realization. Students will be introduced to the fundamentals of human rights, the global human rights machinery, and the ethics of humanitarian intervention, and will consider how sociologists have studied and written about human rights.

This course focuses primarily on the study of French diplomatic actors, their practices, and their interactions with their counterparts in various contexts, including international crisis management, multilateral negotiation processes, and power relations within the French state. At the same time, it encourages students to produce an analysis, to generalize where possible, and to propose theoretical explanations for the social phenomena studied. Designed as an interactive seminar, this course provides participants with an opportunity to refine their understanding of the issues involved and sharpen their critical thinking skills by reading selected texts and meeting with key players in the field. Thus, diplomats with varied profiles are invited to at least two sessions to allow the group to compare academic perspectives with practitioners' experiences and, for those particularly interested in careers at the Quai d'Orsay, to gain a concrete understanding of the profession. The approach draws mainly on political science, but also on sociology and history, in a multidisciplinary perspective to shed as much light as possible on the subject in all its complexity.