Political Science

Around the globe, right-wing populist and extremist movements and parties are on the rise. In some democracies, they have marginalized or even replaced mainstream conservative parties, in others – like in the US – they have radicalized them. In light of their typically ultranationalist (“America first”) and frequently isolationist and protectionist policy positions, it is somewhat counterintuitive that these actors would form cross-border alliances. And yet, the transnational networking of radicalized conservatives, right-wing populists and even extremists has increased in recent years. Gatherings such as the US-based Conservative Political Action Conferences (CPAC) have featured more and more international participants and high-level speakers. Common themes such as the “anti-woke agenda” can be observed across many different countries. In the seminar, we will explore the extent and relevance of these transnational networks, focusing on ideological exchanges and cross-border learning of strategies and tactics, including political communication.

How does government work? This course focuses on public policy and management, especially on their recent development and on changes in public service delivery under NPM (New Public Management) and NPG (New Public Governance). Through cases of various nation states and local governments, the course discusses main issues about public management, focusing on its historical and theoretical background. Special attention will be paid to centre-periphery relationship and possibility of devolved government. The course also discusses recent topics such as privatization, deregulation, decentralization, devolution and agencification. 

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 advanced knowledge of the different moments of international relations and the development in Latin America from the 19th century to the present. The course provides the ability to: a) identify and compare the different interpretations of the history of development and international relations in Latin America; b) detect and analyze the features of continuity and discontinuity in the dynamics of the western hemisphere, in relation to changes in the international system; c) discuss, from a global perspective, the development models in Latin America from the 19th century to the present. The course presents the principal issues in the history of development and international relations in Latin America from independence to the 21st century. Starting from the analysis of the consequences, for the Latin American area, of the Napoleonic invasion of the Iberian Peninsula, the course analyzes the international dimension of the processes of state building and, subsequently, of nation building, the inclusion of Latin American countries in the dynamics of the first globalization, the consolidation of the export-led growth strategy model, the transition to mass democracies and, in some cases, the structuring of populist regimes, the definition of the ISI development model, the evolution of the Pan-American system and, then, the inter-American diffusion of the dynamics of the Cold War, the diffusion of the Washington Consensus, of forms of regional integration and, later, of nationalist movements.

This course examines the evolution of global internet governance. It focuses on the changing role of key actors and conflicts between them – the conflict between private or public oversight, the rise of multistakeholderism, and the attempts of democratic as well as authoritarian states to increase their regulatory grip. It also focuses on key issues of global internet governance such as privacy protection, content control, or cyber security. The course starts from the assumption that despite its dynamics, internet governance is politics like any other and can be understood with standard social science tools, particularly with concepts from international relations and political science.

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 analyzes the genealogy of the relationship power-opinion-public-democracy, which is constituted in political modernity, observing its genesis, its aporias, its theoretical and historical transformations. At the end of the course, the student: is familiar with the political authors who have contributed to the reflection on this relationship; is able to understand the dialectic it establishes with other concepts of political modernity, such as domination, representation, freedom, both with respect to the crisis and to the new potentialities that the articulation of power-public-opinion-democracy is experiencing in the era of the digital revolution; is able to apply these categories to the analysis of the present . The course examines the nature, structure, and critical role of public opinion and its relation with political and social institutions in the 19th century. It includes readings by some of the most important political thinkers on the relationship between democracy and public opinion, like Alexis de Tocqueville and John Stuart Mill. The course analyzes the social and political transformations enabled in public opinion by the process of democratization during 20th century with the help of authors like Tarde, Bentley, Lippmann, Dewey, and Hannah Arendt. During the second part, the course uses authors like Adorno and Marcuse, Lazersfeld and Kaplan, Debord, Habermas, Baudrillard, and Bourdieu to understand the new political configurations of the public opinion in the age of mass democracy; finally, the course analyzes the crisis of public opinion in the age of globalization, the age of information, the show society age, the post-truth and fake news age, and the possibility for public opinion in contemporary democracies to gain (or not) a new political role.

Although Australia is one of Japan's most important partners in the current international arena, the real picture of Australian society remains unfamiliar to Japanese people. After fighting each other in WWII, Australia and Japan have built a firm relationship through human exchange and trade. In recent years, they are strengthening their ties in the field of security, resulting in a “special strategic partnership.” This course is expected to deepen one's knowledge about Australia - Japan's Asia Pacific neighbor. 

This course focuses on the substantive role that China plays in the Global South where its preponderance of material power and putative developing country status confers upon it a dominant position in bilateral and regional political economies.  China's economic position, coupled to an astute use of finances flowing from its mercantilist policies, has enabled it to become the leading trading partner and a significant investor in the developing world.  Moreover, the Global South is increasingly figuring in Beijing's expanding security interests and soft power provisions.  Interpretations embedded in prevailing academic discourses like socialisation, threat and peaceful rise take on new meaning when studied through the lens of ties with developing countries.  Understanding how dynamics in this relationship are impacting upon a host of global and contemporary issues (BRICs, multilateralism, peacekeeping, the environment) is crucial to the shape of the 21st century.

This course explores the role of the media in contemporary liberal democracies and the actors who intervene in the process of political communication: governments, political parties, journalists, interest groups, and social movements. It also focuses on the main theories on the social influence of the media and how to run an electoral campaign (interviews, debates, polls, ads, etc.)

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 topics for this course differ each term. In spring 2024, the course focused on a close reading of selections from Niccolò Machiavelli’s major works. This course focuses on the major topics, ideas, problems, and authors of Western Political Philosophy and its history. The course introduces an advanced level of reading, analyzing, and deep understanding of key themes and concepts in the Western tradition of political philosophy. The course develops strong skills in critical reading, including describing and analyzing the conceptual framework of and the specific historiographical debates on some of the major texts in the field, in their historical and cultural context. The course also focuses on Machiavelli's historical background and influence. The course pays particularly detailed attention to the questions of power, violence, ontology’s relationship with politics, and Machiavelli’s reading of his classical and medieval sources.

This course introduces some major theories of international relations, providing students with a better understanding of world events and opportunities to critically engage with theories to assess their usefulness and limits. The course aims to equip students with intellectual tools with which they can better navigate themselves in the world as broadly informed and critically minded global citizens.