Transnational Politics and Institutions (STG-MA-A05-23)

STG-MA-A05-23

Description

The course is divided into TWO parts:

Part I: Main theories, concepts, and perspectives

Part I will review the foundations of international relations, both historically and in terms of theoretical traditions, including some of the major conceptual frameworks that scholars of International Relations have employed to explain outcomes in world politics. It will connect these to contemporary notions of global and transnational governance and their analytical and normative implications. It will introduce the students to some important theories, actors, and regional dynamics of transnational institutions. We will focus in particular on the role of relative power, states, institutions and ideas in shaping governance as well as the locations of authority and power relations. We will explore the panoply of actors that seek to participate in governance at the local, regional, national, and global levels. These include not only states and institutions but also NGOs, transnational networks, epistemic communities, and global civil society at large. We conceive of these concepts as intellectual devices to make sense of the complexity of transnational processes that involve multiple agents interacting at different levels of interest aggregation.

Part II: Issue-areas in IR and Transnational Governance

Part II will shift the focus to substantive iss ue areas and policy challenges. Drawing on the conceptual knowledge explored in the first part of the course, the students will be able to revisit the broad range of global governance domains that have already been covered in the first semester and will be explored further in second year tracks. These include peace operations and military interventions; transnational security threats, such as crime and terrorism; weapons proliferation and the global arms trade; weapons of mass destruction and the global nuclear (dis)order; global civil society and human rights; global economic governance including trade, sustainable development and humanitarian aid; as well as environmental governance, migration and internet governance. In exploring these case studies, we will evaluate the performance of existing modes of global and transnational governance and scrutinize potential alternatives.

The course will conclude by taking stock of the transnational governance paradigm and by examining possible future trends.