Contemporary Challenges in International Relations
- Introduction to International Relations (lecturer: J.P. Soriano). Students will review major characteristics of the current international scenario and be introduced to some of the critical elements of the analytical toolbox of international relations, including three examples: levels of analysis (factors influencing state behaviour), polarity (international power distribution), and leader's personality traits.
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Geopolitics (lecturer: Blanca Camps-Febrer). What is the relation between geographic factors and politics? How have geography and the physical elements of a country influenced its position in international relations? How have these elements influenced the rise of imperial and national narratives? In these sessions, we will work on understanding the origin of geopolitics as a discipline and learning about the usefulness of the tools and concepts it developed. We will also critically tackle how geopolitics has become a buzzword in the last decade and discuss the political implications of looking at the world through that prism.
- Gender and Armed Conflicts (lecturer: B. Camps-Febrer). This session aims to introduce the relevance and impact of gender within all the phases of armed conflicts. Following the work of feminist scholars and activists, we will approach the gendered nature of conflict, from the gendered knowledge production about conflict to the everyday practices of violence and how they are traversed and reproduced by different gender relations. We will learn how the inclusion of gender is an indispensable analytical category that improves the potential for transformation of armed conflicts, from the agency of local women and civil society groups to the global Women, Peace and Security Agenda and the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
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"Northeast Asia's regional dynamics: contemporary challenges" (lecturer: Patricia Aguado). In this session, students will discuss and analyze the dynamics of Northeast Asia, identifying the contemporary challenges to the region. This bloc will be divided into three sessions, in which students will focus on regional asymmetries, the North Korean nuclear question and the security dilemma in the Korean peninsula, and the post-colonial impact on the Northeast Asian region in terms of identity and nationalism. Students will gain a multidimensional understanding of the key challenges and their implications for the region.
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Latin America: regional and international challenges in an emerging international order (lecturer: J.P. Soriano). Students will identify and analyze contemporary regional and international challenges for Latin America and the Caribbean. This will be done from a multidimensional perspective, but special attention will be given to political and economic regional integration, regional security, Latin America’s relations with the United States, the European Union, and China, and the impact of the geopolitical technological race on Latin America.
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The Sustainable Development Goals: development, peace, and security challenges” (lecturer: P. Aguiar). In 2015, the United Nations General Assembly approved the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which included 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Its implications are not only focused on the international dimension. It calls for a substantial change in public policies at all levels. The subject will analyze the origins of the 2030 Agenda and then will make an overview of how SDGs are being implemented. Furthermore, a process of building indicators of concepts such as Development, Peace, or Security has been done and will be reviewed.
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Polarization: the endemic problem of contemporary democracies (lecturer: P. Aguiar). Conflicts are part of human nature. They must be managed peacefully and constructively to transform them and move forward. This requires dialogue, debate, and the confrontation of ideas. This exchange of ideas can occur based on extreme positions: this is polarization and part of democratic culture. However, for some time now, we have been encountering a perverse dynamic by which dialogue and debate have lost part of their meaning. It is a growing phenomenon in many consolidated democracies, affecting coexistence and social cohesion. It is what we call “toxic polarization.” In addition, we are going to learn why it is happening, how we can identify it, and different ways to tackle it.
Courses generally have little or no prerequisite knowledge required for a given topic, however if students face any doubts, we recommend they contact course professors to clarify.
Contents | Teaching / learning activities |
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WEEK 1 | |
PRESENTATION AND INTRODUCTION TO THE COURSE (first day) |
PRESENTATION OF THE COURSE: key objectives and assessment activities. Introduction to basic concepts of International Relations. |
FIRST TOPIC (1 day): Introduction to International Relations |
FIRST TOPIC: Teaching and learning activities: In this sessions, students will review major characteristics of the current international scenario and will be introduced ro some of the critical elements of the analytical toolbox of International Relations. |
SECOND TOPIC (2 days): "Geopolitics" | SECOND TOPIC: Teaching and learning activities: students will learn about different theories on geopolitics and the concepts developed. We will apply these concepts and tools to the current state of the world to exercise the geopolitical mind and test geopolitics’ standing. |
WEEK 2 | |
THIRD TOPIC (1 day): "Gender and Armed Conflicts" |
THIRD TOPIC: Teaching: Provide an introduction to gender analysis, the cycle of armed conflicts, and the preparation for war. Learning activities: The class is conceived as an active space for participation, with group activities to practice the implementation of gendered analysis and to encourage debate. |
FOURTH TOPIC (3 days): “Northeast Asia's regional dynamics: contemporary challenges"
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FOURTH TOPIC: Teaching and learning activities: Students will identify the main challenges to Northeast Asian dynamics in three sessions: regional asymmetries, North Korea and the Korean peninsula, and post-colonial legacy in terms of identity and rationalism. This class will teach and apply concepts and analytical tools from international relations. Each class will contain lectures and exercises, and presentations or debates will be supervised. |
WEEK 3 | |
FIFTH TOPIC (2 days): “Latin America: regional and international challenges in an emerging international order.” |
FIFTH TOPIC: Teaching and learning activities: Students will identify and analyze contemporary regional and international challenges for Latin America and the Caribbean. This will be done from a multidimensional perspective, but special attention will be given to political and economic regional integration, regional security and transnational crime, and Latin America’s relations with the United States, the European Union, and China. Students will be asked to prepare a short debate on the impact of the global technological race in Latin America. |
TOPICS SIXTH AND SEVENTH (3 days): “The Sustainable Development Goals: development, peace and security challenges,” and “Polarization: the endemic problem of contemporary democracies.”
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TOPICS SIXTH AND SEVENTH: Teaching and learning activities. The first part will focus on the Sustainable Development Goals and the 2030 Agenda, how it was approved, and how it is implemented. The second part will focus on polarization and how we can identify and measure it. Each class will be divided into three parts. The first part will consist of lectures or teaching activities by the professor on the main elements of the subject, organized in consecutive sections. The second part is for exercises, presentations, debates, class participation, and Q&A, which the professor supervises. The third part is reserved for individual questions. |
CLOSING SESSION: |
The first part will consist of lectures or teaching activities by the professor on the main elements of the subject, organized in consecutive sections. The second part is for exercises, presentations, debates, class participation, and Q&A, which the professor supervises. The third part is reserved for individual questions. Guided by the lecturers, the students will summarize what they have reviewed and analyzed about the four different subjects of the course. They will also debate how the topics are interlinked. |
From Monday to Friday.
From 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.
Each subject has different evaluation activities within the development of the corresponding section. At the end of the course, the final evaluation of this course will be the average of the four subjects or topics of this course.
IMPORTANT: All students must complete the mandatory readings for the sessions. This is very important for completing the different scheduled activities during each session.
“Geopolitics, and Gender and Armed Conflicts” (22,5% of the final grade).
- 25% of the grade will be based on attendance and participation in the debates.
- 50% of the grade will be based on one individual short commentary.
- 25% of the grade will be based on a group project developed in class and finished outside class.
"Northeast Asia's regional dynamics: contemporary challenges" (22,5% of the final grade)
- 25% of the grade will be based on attendance and participation in the debates.
- 40% of the grade will be based on one individual exercise to do outside the class.
- 35% of the grade will be based on a group exercise/presentation in class.
“Latin America: regional and international challenges in an emerging international order” (22,5% of the final grade).
- 25% of the grade will be based on attendance and participation in the debates.
- 40% of the grade will be based on a short multiple-choice exam.
- 35% participation in a debate (includes a written summary of the debate indicating key arguments).
“The Sustainable Development Goals: development, peace and security challenges”, and “Polarization: endemic problem of contemporary democracies” (22,5% of the final grade).
- 25% of the grade will be based on attendance and participation in the debates.
- 75% of the grade will be based on the three short exercises/presentations that students will do in classes (each one counts 25% of the grade).
Participation and attendance (10% of the final grade).
Geopolitics
- Criekemans, David. Geopolitics and International Relations: Grounding World Politics Anew. Boston: BRILL, 2021.
- Dittmer, J. Popular Culture, Geopolitics, and Identity. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. 2010.
- Dodds, K. Geopolitics: A Very Short Introduction, 3rd Edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2019.
- Dowler, L. and Sharp, J. “A feminist geopolitics,” Space and Polity 5. pp.165–176. 2001.
- Flint, Colin. Introduction to Geopolitics, 4th Edition. London: Routledge. 2022.
- Gilmartin, M. and Kofman, E. “Critically feminist geopolitics,” in L.A. Staeheli, E. Kofman and L.J. Peake (eds.). Mapping Women, Making Politics. New York and Abingdon, UK: Routledge. pp. 113–125. 2004.
- Tuathail, Gearóid Ó, Dalby, Simon and Paul Routledge (eds.). 1998. The Geopolitics Reader. London and New York, Routledge.
Gender and Armed Conflicts
- ABU-LUGHOD, L. (2013). Do Muslim Women Need Saving? Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
- AOLÁIN, FN; CAHN, N; HAYNES, D; & VALJI, N; (eds) (2008). The Oxford Handbook on Gender and Conflict. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- BULMER, S. & EICHLER, M. (2017) “Unmaking militarized masculinity: veterans and the project of military-to-civilian transition”, Critical Military Studies, 3:2, 161-181, DOI: 10.1080/23337486.2017.1320055
- CARPENTER, Ch. (2006). “Recognizing Gender-Based Violence Against Men and Boys in Conflict Situations”, Security Dialogue, vol.37, no.1, 2006.
- COCKBURN, C. (2013) “War and security, women and gender: an overview of the issues”, Gender & Development, 21:3, 433-452, DOI: 10.1080/13552074.2013.846632
- ENLOE, C. (2014) Bananas, Beaches and Bases, Berkley: University of California Press.
- SJOBERG, L. (2013). Gendering Global Conflict: Toward a Feminist Theory of War. New York: Columbia University Press.
- TRUE, J. (2012) The Political Economy of Violence Against Women. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Northeast Asia's regional dynamics: contemporary challenges
- Choi, J. & Moon, C (2010). Understanding Northeast Asian regional dynamics: inventory checking and new discourses on power, interest, and identity, International Relations of the Asia-Pacific, 10(2). 343–372, https://doi.org/10.1093/irap/lcq003
- Shibata, R. (2018). Identity, nationalism and threats to Northeast Aisa Peace, Journal of Peacebuilding & Development, 13(3), 86–100. https://www.jstor.org/stable/48603229
- Son, S. A. (2015). Unity, Division and Ideational Security on the Korean Peninsula: Challenges to Overcoming the Korean Conflict. North Korean Review, 11(2), 45–62. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43908968
- Howe, B. (2010). North Korea’s Insecurity Dilemma. North Korean Review, 6(2), 74–85. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43908814
- Moon, C. (2017). 7. China’s Rise and Security Dynamics on the Korean Peninsula. In R. Ross & O. Tunsjo (Ed.), Strategic Adjustment and the Rise of China: Power and Politics in East Asia (pp. 196-230). Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. https://doi.org/10.7591/9781501712777-010
- Roland, G. (2021). China’s rise and its implications for International Relations and Northeast Asia, Asia and the Global Economy, 1(2), 1-9 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.aglobe.2021.100016
- Latin America: regional and international challenges in an emerging international order
- BIANCULLI, Andrea (2024), Latin America on the new international stage: what room for regionalism and regional cooperation?, Revista CIDOB d’Afers Internacionals, n.º 136 (April), pp. 89-110. https://www.cidob.org/en/publications/latin-america-new-international-stage-what-room-regionalism-and-regional-cooperation
- MORENO, Luis Alberto (2021), “Latin America's Lost Decades”, Foreign Affairs, January/February 2021.
- SHIFTER, Michael and Binetti, Bruno (eds.) (2019). Unfulfilled Promises. Latin America Today. The Inter-American Dialogue. The book is open access and can be downloaded from: https://www.thedialogue.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/unfulfilled-promises-english-new.pdf
- STUENKEL, Oliver (2021), “Latin American Governments Are Caught in the Middle of the U.S.-China Tech War”, Foreign Policy, February.
- STUENKEL, O. (2022). “The Ukraine War May Hasten the Return of Great Power Politics in Latin America”. Retrieved from https://carnegieendowment.org/2022/06/23/ukraine-war-may-hasten-return-of-great-power-politics-in-latin-america-pub-87381
- VAN RAEMDONCK, Nathalie (2020), “Balancing between giants, Latin-America’s international cybersecurity position”. ARI 104/2020. Real Instituto Elcano, September. https://media.realinstitutoelcano.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/ari104-2020-raemdonck-balancing-between-giants-latin-americas-international-cybersecurity-position.pdf
- ZHANG, Pepe; Canuto, Otaviano (2023), “Global Leadership for Latin America and the Caribbean”, Project Syndicate, September 12. https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/latin-america-caribbean-global-leadership-food-climate-finance-by-pepe-zhang-and-otaviano-canuto-2023-09
The Sustainable Development Goals: development, peace and security challenges
- Laila El Baradei (2019) Politics of Evidence Based Policy Making: Reporting on SDG 16 in Egypt, International Journal of Public Administration
- UN General Assembly (2015) “Resolution on Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” A/RES/70/1 available at https://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/RES/70/1&Lang=E
- UN Sustainable Development Goals: https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/
- WALTER LEAL FILHO, Ulisses Azeiteiro, Fátima Alves, Paul Pace, Mark Mifsud, Luciana Brandli, Sandra S. Caeiro & Antje Disterheft (2018). Reinvigorating the sustainable development research agenda: the role of the sustainable development goals (SDG), International Journal of Sustainable Development & World Ecology, 25:2, 131-142
Polarization: endemic problem of contemporary democracies
- BARBET, B. (2020). Enquesta sobre polarització i convivència a Catalunya 2020. Informes 17/2020. Barcelona: Institut Català Internacional per la Pau. http://www.icip.cat/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/informes_2020-17_cat.pdf
- BRANDSMA, B. (2017) “Polarisation. Understanding the Dynamics of Us vs. Them” Uitgegeven door BB in Media.
- GIDRON, N., Adams, J., i Horne, W. (2018, August). “How ideology, economics and institutions shape affective polarization in democratic politics”. In Annual conference of the American political science association.
- MCCOY, J. and Somer, M. (2019) “Toward a Theory of Pernicious Polarization and How It Harms Democracies: Comparative Evidence and Possible Remedies”, ANNALS, AAPSS 681.
- REILJAN, A. (2020). “‘Fear and loathing across party lines’(also) in Europe: Affective polarisation in European party Systems”. European journal of political research, 59(2), 376-396.
- Torcal, M., i Comellas, J. M. (2022). “Affective polarisation in times of political instability and conflict. Spain from a comparative perspective”. South European Society and Politics, 1-26.
Pablo Aguiar. Holds a Master on Cooperation for Development at Cidob. Currently he works as a Researcher at ICIP (International Catalan Institute for Peace) and as Associate Professor of International Relations at the Faculty of Political Sciences, UAB. His main research areas are Peace Studies, Cooperation for Development and Polarization in Democracies.
- E-mail: paguiar@icip.cat
Blanca Camps-Febrer. Political Scientist with a PhD on Politics, Policies and International Relations by the Autonomous University of Barcelona. Since she graduated in 2003, she has been involved in gender-equality projects, within the field of cooperation for development and as a researcher on Human Rights issues. Camps-Febrer worked in Morocco and Palestine on development cooperation projects especially related to gender issues and human rights, and various programs to strengthen organizations of victims of enforced disappearances in the Mediterranean. Camps-Febrer is an active member of the Research Group IRWANA (https://transmena.wordpress.com/). She is also a member of the Gender Committee in the Center for Peace Studies JM Delàs (https://centredelas.org/expertes/blanca-camps-febrer/?lang=en), a reference think tank on militarism and armed conflicts based in Barcelona.
- E-mail: blanca.camps@uab.cat
Juan Pablo Soriano. Master and PhD in Political Science from the UAB. Master’s in international security, University of Hull, UK. BA in Political Science from UNAM, Mexico. Associated Lecturer in International Relations, at the Faculty of Political Sciences and Sociology, UAB. Research interests: international relations of Latin America, international security (traditional and non-traditional security matters), foreign policy analysis, trans-Atlantic relations, Euro-Latin American relations.
- E-mail: juanpablo.soriano@uab.cat
Patricia Aguado. Holds a Master’s degree in International Relations, Security, and Development from the Autonomous University of Barcelona. She currently works as a substitute professor of International Relations at the UAB while completing her PhD at Ewha Womans University in South Korea. Her research interests include international relations theories, international relations in East Asia, security in the Korean peninsula, and identity issues in international relations.
- E-mail: patricia.aguado@uab.cat
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