I am still in the process of updating this syllabus from the last time I taught it at Florida State. The basic outline of the course remains the same, but there will be quite a few updates in the assigned readings. There are only two required books for PSCI 5820.001 in Fall 2009, with the rest of the readings being composed of journal articles and individual book chapters. Feel free to buy the books wherever you can find them cheapest:
- Michael T. Klare (2001). Resource Wars. New York: Owl Books. (ISBN 0-8050-5576-2)
- Jared Diamond (1999). Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. New York: W. W. Norton and Company. (ISBN 0393317552)
The rest of this syllabus will be made available on this web site no later than the first day of class, which will be Wednesday, September 2.
Note that the room for this class has been changed -- we will be meeting in the Poli Sci seminar room, 130 WH, rather than the room that was originally scheduled for the course (214 WH).
INR 5014: Contexts and International Relations | ||
|
Dr. Paul Hensel |
Spring 2007 Semester | |
Description
Most political scientists study international relations "in a vacuum," without reference to the geographic and historical context in which events take place. The central goal of this course is to consider the impact of geography and history, and to study the many ways that such contextual forces can influence international processes. This goal will be pursued through a variety of theoretical and empirical readings on the impact of geography and history, in-class presentations on weekly topics, and a research paper dealing with contextual effects in international relations.
It must be emphasized that this is not a course in geography or history, but rather a course that examines the ways that geographic and historical factors influence international relations. Students seeking a course in geography or history are advised to look to FSU's Geography and History departments for courses such as Economic Geography, Military Geography, Political Geography, or any of a variety of history courses, because they will certainly be disappointed with this course. We will not examine the geography or history of specific countries or regions; we will focus on theoretical and analytical applications of geographic and historical influences on traditional international relations topics such as international conflict and trade; and the readings for this course were primarily written by and intended for political scientists. Furthermore, this course will not be post-modern or constructivist in its approach (although several of the readings may draw from such theoretical frameworks); like the rest of FSU's Political Science department, this course will focus on the development and (largely quantitative) testing of systematic theories on political phenomena.
This course is part of the Political Science Ph.D. program, but is open to graduate students from any department or program at FSU. The course will involve intensive reading of advanced scholarly research; nearly every reading that is assigned involves quantitative data analysis, formal mathematical models, or both. While students are not necessarily expected to be able to produce their own quantitative and/or formal research, they must be able to understand and discuss this type of work. Students who are unable to do so or who are unwilling to accept the validity of quantitative analyses of human activities are advised to avoid this course, as they will be wasting both their own time and that of their classmates, and their grades for participation and for the discussion papers will reflect this.
Required Texts
This is a heavily article-focused course, with only three books being required. The following books have not been listed with any of the campus bookstores, but can be ordered from any online bookstore (such as amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com, half.com, or powells.com). Feel free to order the paperback rather than hardcover edition, and/or to order a used rather than new copy if desired.
* Michael T. Klare (2001). Resource Wars. New York: Owl Books.
* Walter Mattli (1999). The Logic of Regional Integration: Europe and Beyond. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
* Jared Diamond (1999). Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. New York: W. W. Norton and Company.
All other readings may be borrowed for personal usage from Dr. Hensel's office (563 Bellamy). The readings will be made available outside my office door at least one week before they are needed for class; please return them as soon as possible for other students' use. Many of the readings are also available through JSTOR or FSU's other e-journal subscriptions.
Course Requirements
(1) Attendance and Participation
Because this is a graduate seminar, the instructor will not run class meetings as a lecture; all students are expected to come to each class meeting prepared to discuss the readings. This will involve spending the time to read each book or article on the reading list, and thinking about what each reading contributes to the weekly topic. Class discussion every week will focus on such issues as the theoretical arguments being made (explicitly or implicitly), the empirical evidence that is marshaled to test these arguments, weaknesses or shortcomings of the work so far, and potential directions for future research. Class participation will count for 20% of the overall course grade. Note that coming to class late, or missing class without documentation of a very pressing concern, is completely unacceptable in a graduate seminar and will be penalized accordingly.
(2) In-Class Presentations
Beyond regular class attendance and active participation in class discussion, each student is expected to make 3-5 presentations to the rest of the class on the weekly topics (with the total depending on the number of students taking the course). The presentations should involve identifying one or more important questions related to the week's topic that have been left unanswered or answered incompletely by the readings (and offering tentative suggestions on how such gaps might be filled in future research), and/or proposing some extension of the week's readings to a new question or area; the discussion questions suggested in the syllabus offer a good place to begin in thinking about these presentations. These presentations are meant to help focus the class discussion on new directions from the week's readings, and to help identify interesting directions for future research (perhaps even for this course's research paper). They should be written from a research-oriented, academic perspective, rather than a literature review or a Siskel-and-Ebert-style review ("I liked/hated this article"), and should be constructive; criticisms of assigned readings should be accompanied by one or more suggestions about how to overcome the problems, with appropriate discussion of the implications of these suggestions for the body of research. Each presentation should be described in a roughly 3-to-4-page paper to be handed in for evaluation. Together, these presentations will count for 20% of the course grade.
The following general grading scale will be used for participation and presentations:
* A to A-: The student made a very strong contribution to the course. Class discussion, comments, and/or presentations reflected a great deal of thought about the material, and were constructive (for example, not only identifying current weaknesses and showing how these weaknesses limit the current literature, but suggesting useful future directions that could help to overcome these weaknesses or to extend the literature in important ways).
* B+ to B-: The student contributed meaningfully to the course. Class participation and/or presentations went beyond repeating the assigned material, perhaps identifying weaknesses in the current literature, but did not make many constructive suggestions about how these weaknesses might be overcome or how the literature might usefully be extended in the future.
* C+ or lower: The student did not contribute meaningfully. Class participation and/or presentations were limited to repeating the assigned material rather than making connections or extensions, or was filled with mistakes and inaccuracies.
* F: The student was a net drain on the course, rarely if ever speaking in class or failing to make the required number of presentations.
(3) Research Paper
Another requirement is an original research paper, involving the application of a (geographic or historical) contextual approach to some IR problem of the student's choosing. This paper may be quantitative or qualitative in nature, depending on the nature of the question and the student's methodological training, but in any case it must be analytical and theoretical in nature rather than descriptive; the paper should attempt to test hypotheses about contextual processes or contextual influences in world politics (focusing on geographic or historical contexts except with the permission of the instructor). The final paper must be 20-30 pages in length, and should be comparable to an academic journal article in style. Please note that this must be an original paper for this course, and can not overlap in any substantial way with a paper written for another course, such as the department's first year paper requirement; if there is any question please talk to me about it and bring me a copy of the other paper (or turn it in to me along with this paper).
A proposal for each student's paper topic must be submitted to the instructor for approval no later than February 21. This proposal -- which must be primarily theoretical (the research design and data issues can be addressed later) -- will involve a brief (2-3 pages) description of the paper topic, including a statement of what the student plans to study and a discussion of the basic theoretical logic and hypotheses. A research design (8-10 pages) must be turned in by March 21, involving more detailed discussion of the paper's hypotheses, spatial-temporal domain, data sources, and similar topics; at this point the basic ideas of the paper should be finalized, with only the implementation and writeup remaining to be done. The completed paper is due at the start of the last class (April 18), at which point each student will make a short presentation on his or her paper to the rest of the class. This paper project will count for a total of 40% of the overall course grade, of which 5% each will be based on the initial proposal and the research design. The paper will be graded on the clarity and contribution of the theory as an addition to the literature on geographic or historical contexts and international relations, as well as on the appropriateness of the analyses as a test of this theory.
(4) Take-home final exam
The course will conclude with a take-home final exam, which is meant to assess your understanding and integration of the topics covered throughout the semester. The questions for this final exam will be handed out in the last regular class meeting, and answers will be due no later than the scheduled exam time for this course (Thursday, April 26, between 10 AM - Noon). The final exam will count for 20% of the overall course grade.
Course Outline
For the weekly schedule of topics, assigned readings, and optional readings, please download the complete syllabus in PDF format.
http://www.paulhensel.org/Teaching/gradcontexts.html
Last updated: 4 July 2008
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