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The dramatic events in Europe in the late 1980s and early 1990s, from the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 to the complete collapse of the Soviet Union by 1991, led many pundits to proclaim that a new era of peace and prosperity would be ushered in with the victory of the democratic and capitalist ideologies of "the West." U.S. President George H.W. Bush hailed a "New World Order" that would present new opportunities for cooperation and the enforcement of international law, as demonstrated so decisively, according to many believers, by the UN-approved military mission against Iraq in the Gulf War in 1991. However, critics of this vision were quick to argue that disorder rather than order would be the defining characteristic of world politics after the Cold War. These pessimistic critics have pointed to recent political violence in many places across the globe, including Somalia, Rwanda, and the erstwhile Yugoslavia, as evidence that violence and disorder will continue to be standard themes in world politics. Pessimism about the prospects for a peaceful world order peaked in the United States after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, and the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 without UN approval has reinforced pessimists' doubts about the effectiveness of international law.
In this course, we will explore a variety of competing arguments regarding the state of world order at the turn of the century. In doing so, we will examine major theoretical and conceptual questions in the study of world politics. Should peace be defined as the mere absence of war and violent conflict, or should it be defined more broadly to include the achievement of social and economic justice? What constitutes a stable world order? Are bipolar international systems more or less stable than multipolar or unilateral distributions of power? We also will consider how values and the assumptions of scholars shape their study of world politics and how our own values and assumptions influence our analyses. In this way, this course is designed to help students learn to think critically not only about actual events in world politics but also about how world politics are analyzed by scholars, politicians, and individuals.
The Department of Politics and International Relations seeks to induct students into the community of liberally educated individuals who are capable of understanding government and politics in terms of the theories, concepts, and tools of sophisticated political analysis which characterize the discipline of political science. The liberal-arts dimension of our mission stems from our belief that all people are embedded in a political environment which acts upon them in ways they must understand if they are to function effectively as active participants in a democratic society. Our goal, therefore, is not to train professional political scientists, but rather to produce the liberally educated citizen who is fluent in the language of politics and political analysis and thereby has a foundation for both citizenship in a democratic society and successful training in a job, in a graduate school, or in a professional school. Such a person has the capacity to recognize and evaluate assumptions, implications, and causal relationships pertaining to government and politics and, by extension, to other realms of human experience. Go to the home page of the Department of Politics and International Relations for more information on the basic objectives of the general program and upper-level courses in the department.
Additional course-specific objectives include the following:
1. To help students gain an understanding of how values-- their own as well as those of others-- shape our understanding of world politics
2. To encourage students to think critically not only about world politics but also about how it is studied
3. To help students develop an ability to analyze current issues in world politics from a variety of perspectives
4. To help students develop and improve their writing skills
1. Two exams (50%): Students will take a midterm exam during the semester and a final exam at the end of the semester. These exams will consist of short answer and essay questions. Both the short answer and essay questions will require students to think analytically about the course material and to integrate information from readings, lectures, classroom discussions, and where relevant, current events in world politics. Each exam will be worth 25% of your final grade. Exams will be graded for content, grammar, and style. I also will expect you to incorporate explicit references to the required readings. Though the final exam questions will focus largely on the course material covered since the midterm, they also will require students to build upon the cumulative knowledge they have gained throughout the course.
**Make-up exams will be given only in the case of family emergencies and serious illness, and I will require you to document your illness or emergency. In order to take a make-up exam, you must have a legitimate, verifiable family emergency or illness, and you must contact me in advance of the exam. Make-up exams must be taken within five days of the original exam date unless exceptional circumstances warrant a longer extension.
2. Current events analytical papers (40%): Each student will be required to keep track of current events in world politics and to consider the implications of these events in light of the course material we are reading. At the end of each section of the course, I will require you to turn in a 7-10 page (typed, double-spaced with standard margins) paper in which you highlight the major news events that have unfolded during that section of the course and in which you analyze these current events in light of the course material we have covered. To this end, you should comment on whether major news events provide any insight into the state of world politics in the post-Cold War era. It will be especially useful if you look for evidence that either supports or contradicts the arguments we are reading in class. This assignment, then, is designed to encourage you to make connections between "real-world" events and the scholarly arguments we are reading in class. You will have to complete two analyses of current events, each at the end of a section of the course, and we will discuss current world politics during class on the days the current events papers are due. Note: in order to write effective analyses of current events, you need to keep track of current events on a regular basis. I recommend that students keep a "current events journal" in order to accomplish this goal. These journals may be handwritten and may be kept in regular notebooks, though you also may keep them in a word processing file. Each current events analytical paper will be worth 20% of your final course grade, and grades on late written analyses of current events will be lowered by 1% point per day. (Note: this deduction means your final grade will be lowered by 1% point per late day.)
3. Class attendance and participation (10%): Class attendance and participation will be worth 10% of the final course grade. In regards to attendance, you will be allowed two unexcused absences. After that, your participation grade will be lowered by 1% for each unexcused absence. An absence is excused only in the case of personal illness or family emergency. You must notify me in advance for your absence to be excused, and I may require you to document your illness or emergency. (Student athletes, musicians etc. also will be excused to participate in university-sponsored events but must provide me with the appropriate documentation forms.) Arriving late to class is disruptive and is rude both to the instructor and other students. If you arrive late to class, I will count you as absent for that day.
In regards to class participation, students should come to class prepared to ask and answer questions on the assigned readings. You need to participate actively in the class, but you should not attempt to dominate class discussion. I expect that students often will disagree with each other and with me. I will encourage an atmosphere in which we are free to challenge and criticize each other's arguments, but I expect all of us to be respectful and civil in our disagreements. Your participation grade will reflect the extent to which you come to class prepared to discuss the assigned readings in a thoughtful, productive, and civil manner. I reserve the right to give "pop-quizzes" at any time during the semester. I have done so in the past when students are not prepared for class.
In accordance with the emphasis on student-centered learning in Drake's mission statement, this course will stress active student learning. I expect that your consistent attendance and participation will facilitate your understanding of the course material. Moreover, because you will be required to integrate information from readings, lectures, and classroom discussions on the midterm and the final, your performance on the exams should benefit from consistent attendance and participation.
4. Cheating and plagiarism will not be tolerated. Plagiarism is the act of trying to pass off someone else's ideas, words, thoughts or inventions as one's own. Plagiarism may be intentional or unintentional, but it is a violation of academic integrity in either case. You must acknowledge your use of other's work when you quote them word for word (you must use quotation marks in the case of direct quotations), paraphrase, borrow ideas, incorporate factual information from someone else's work, or rely on another person's organization of material. You do not need to provide citations for common knowledge, but it is better to err on the side of caution if you have any doubts. If your paper includes uncited information and/or I suspect plagiarism, I will not grade your paper until you provide satisfactory documentation of your sources. If I discover a case of cheating or plagiarism, I will impose the most serious penalty allowed under university regulations and contingent on the nature of the violation. See the statement on Academic Honesty and Integrity at the Department of Politics and IR homepage for further details. Also, see me if you still have questions about academic dishonesty.
A 90-100 (Excellent)
B 80-89 (Good)
C 70-79 (Satisfactory)
D 60-69 (Poor)
F 0-59 (Failure)
1. Barber, Benjamin R., Jihad vs. McWorld: How Globalism and Tribalism are Reshaping the World (New York: Ballantine Books, 1996)
2. Thomas Friedman, The Lexus and the Olive Tree (Anchor Books, 2000)
3. Frances Fukayama, The End of History and the Last Man (Avon Books, 1993)
4. Samuel Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (Touchstone Books, 1998)
5. Robert Kaplan, The Coming Anarchy (Vintage Books, 2001)
6. In order to perform well in this course, you obviously will need to keep abreast of current world politics. I will not require you to subscribe to a specific newspaper. However, you are required to follow current international events through the media of your choice. Note: since you will be responsible for basic knowledge about world politics, certain choices are likely to be wiser than others. National daily newspapers, such as The New York Times or The Christian Science Monitor, provide far more thorough international coverage than local dailes. You also can obtain at least basic information in some weekly newsmagazines or by following CNN. In addition to these examples, most national newspapers and television networks maintain on-line sources of news.
7. Online Journals/ Academic Universe/ Lexis-Nexis: You can access a variety of resources on world politics, including full text newspaper articles, legal resources, and reference information on specific countries, on the Resources and Reference Page of Cowles Library.
8. Finally, Foreign Affairs Online is an excellent web resource which provides links to sites in a variety of categories, including international law, human rights, and the United Nations.
READING ASSIGNMENTS AND SCHEDULE
Part I Conflict and Insecurity in the "New World Disorder" or the "Same Old, Same Old World Order": In this section of the course, we will examine pessimistic assessments of the prospects for peace in the post-Cold War world order. Most of the authors in this section have been associated with the realist school of thought in international relations. These realists tend to argue either that the "stability" of the international system under the bipolar structure of the Cold War will be replaced with uncertainty and insecurity or that conflict in the "new" world order simply reflects the constant danger of insecurity and violence in any world order. We also will read excerpts from Chomsky's World Orders Old and New. Chomsky's work reflects a Marxist tradition of analysis which suggests that economic factors drive world politics and that the current world order is characterized by economic inequality and exploitation, just as the old one was.
8/25 Introduction to course; Discussion and lecture: How should we define "peace" and "world order"?
8/27 Discussion and lecture: Causes of War and Realist Perspectives on the Cold War and post-Cold War world
9/1 Labor Day, no class
9/3 Huntington, Chpt. 1
9/8 Huntington, Chpts. 2 and 3
9/10 Huntington, Chpts. 8 and 9
9/15 Huntington, Chpts. 10 and 11
9/17 Huntington, Chpt. 12
9/22 Kaplan, Chpt. I
9/24 Kaplan, Chpt. II
9/29 Kaplan, Chpt. III
10/1 Kaplan, Chpt. V-VII
10/6 Kaplan, Chpt. VIII-IX
10/8 Chomsky, excerpt from World Orders, Old & New (I will hand out this reading assignment in class)
10/13 Written analysis of current events #1 due; discussion
10/15 MIDTERM EXAM
10/20 Fall Break, no class
Part II Democracy, Trade, and Peace in the "New World Order": This section of the course will explore works focused on the status of democracy and peace in the post-Cold War world order. In particular, these works consider the relationships among democracy, trade, and peace in an increasingly globalized world. The readings in this section, most closely associated with various liberal perspectives on world politics, differ in their degree of optimism regarding whether or not the expansion of democracy and/or market economies will contribute to peace in the post-Cold War world order.
10/22 Fukayama, Part I
10/27 Fukayama, Part II
10/29 Fukayama, Part II and Part IV
11/3 Fukayama, Part IV
11/5 Fukayama, Part V
11/10 Friedman, Part I
11/12 Friedman, Part II
11/17 Friedman, Part III
11/19 Friedman, Part IV
11/24 Dani Rodrik, "Trading in Illusions," Foreign Policy March/ April 2001: 55-62; Lawrence F. Kaplan, "Trade Barrier," The New Republic July 19 & 16, 2001: 23-27
11/26 Thanksgiving Break, no class
12/1 Barber: Introduction and Part I, pp. 3-151
12/3 Barber: Part II, pp. 155-216
12/8 Barber: Part III, pp. 219-292 and Afterword, pp. 293-300
12/10 Written analysis of current events #2 due; concluding discussion; class evaluations
The final exam is scheduled for Thursday, December 18 at 7:30 a.m. I may decide to give a take-home exam instead.