POL 380 - Global Politics Seminar

FDR: SS2
Planned Offering: Offered when interest is expressed and departmental resources permit.
Credits: 3

Fall 2016, POL 380A-01: Global Issues in Big Data, Cybersurveillance, and Privacy Law (3). Co-taught as LAW 335 (2). Prerequisite: At least three credits at the 200-level in politics or instructor consent. Open to majors and non-majors. Meets the global politics field requirement in the politics major. On Mondays, the course meets on the undergraduate campus, 2:30-4:00 pm; on Wednesdays, it will meet in Sydney Lewis Hall, 2:30-4:30 pm. Taught as a joint offering between the Politics Department and the Law School, we address the legal, ethical, and political implications of the impact of technology on privacy around the world. This course entails a study of the development of privacy law in North America and the European Union, analysis of the threats posed by technological growth to individual privacy rights, and the benefits such development brings in areas such as equality rights, medicine, and criminal law. Undergraduates will undertake research projects on a topic of their choice and present their findings and their seminar papers to the class. (SS2) Rush, Hu.

Fall 2016, POL 380C-01: Terror, Sovereignty, and Reprisal (3). Prerequisite: POL 105 or instructor consent. Open to majors and non-majors. Meets the 300-level seminar requirement for the politics major. How do sovereign states respond to violent challenges from non-state actors? This course explores how stateless threats such as pirates, political assassins, and terrorists are understood in international theory and shape international practice. Case studies include maritime piracy in the Mediterranean, the Atlantic, and the Indian Ocean, the assassinations preceding the July Crisis of 1914, and the terrorist attacks that led to the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan. By analyzing the sources and consequences of these events, students learn to think comparatively and conceptually about how states have understood and confronted violent, non-state threats to their legitimacy and existence. Students apply their insights to individual research projects exploring the theoretical, empirical, and ethical implications of a contemporary incident of non-state violence in global politics. (SS2) O’Dell.