INTL

International Affairs at Northeastern

Offers an interdisciplinary approach to analyzing global/international affairs. Examines the politics, economics, culture, and history of current international issues through lectures, guest lectures, film, case studies, and readings across the disciplines.

Globalization and International Affairs

Concentrates on the history, politics, cultures, and economics of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) countries in the 20th and 21st centuries. Explores topics such as empire, colonialism, revolutions, state-building, development, and social movements. Offers students an opportunity to obtain interdisciplinary skills to analyze dynamics of gender, class, race/ethnicity, and religion in MENA countries.

Middle East Studies

Focuses on U.S. engagement with the Middle East, primarily with Muslim societies, and with the Christian and Jewish communities across the region. Emphasizes Egypt, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Israel/Palestine, and Lebanon. From America's first proselytizing adventure to the Ottoman Empire in 1820 to the embrace of Saudi Arabia in the 1940s to the overthrow of the democratically elected prime minister in Iran in 1953 to the attacks of September 11, 2001, to the invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003 to America's response to the “Arab Awakening” in 2011 and beyond, the course covers history, politics, oil, war, and peacemaking within the framework of U.S. involvement in the Middle East.

America and the Middle East

Introduces a variety of issues facing women across the globe. Focuses on the gender dynamics of key issues in international affairs. These could include economic policy, conflict and war, human rights/women's rights, political power, and collective action. Draws on examples from various world regions since the twentieth century to analyze similarities and differences across cases around the globe. INTL 2480 and WMNS 2480 are cross-listed.

Women and World Politics

Examines the relationship between race and the movement of people around the globe. Offers students an opportunity to acquire a concrete understanding of how race and ethnicity (as social constructions) have developed as people have migrated (under free will or forced circumstances) within and across geopolitical territories (i.e., colonies, countries) in the past (1400s) and through the present. Ethnoracial-related conflicts connected to migration (i.e., rebellions by the enslaved during the Atlantic slave trade, Rwandan genocide, Syrian civil war) may also be explored.

Race and Global Human Mobility

Introduces a range of research methods employed in the study of international affairs. Offers students an opportunity to develop competency in the most commonly used quantitative and qualitative research tools in the social sciences and related humanities. Topics include empirical and normative research traditions, generalizability, historical analyses, hypothesis testing, literature reviews, qualitative and quantitative approaches, research ethics, survey research, units of analysis, and more.

Research Methods in International Affairs

Examines the roots of the urbanization process, major ways of thinking about it, and the development of world cities and megacities. The twenty-first century will be a century in which urbanism is a central problem and opportunity. Considers the economic, political, cultural, and environmental dimensions of urbanism across the globe. Includes specific case studies from around the world. Encourages students to develop a knowledge of particular cities in order to examine the key themes of the course. INTL 3200, ANTH 3200, and SOCL 3200 are cross-listed.

Cities in a Global Context

Examines the media’s portrayal of conflicts and the peace process in the Middle East, Northern Ireland, Bosnia, Rwanda, and elsewhere. Evaluates the limits of fairness, balance, and accuracy in the coverage. Looks at the U.S. and international media—print, broadcast, and online—and some of the major stories in recent years and attempts to put these stories in historical, political, and social context. Analyzes the wide-ranging criticism of coverage from a variety of perspectives. INTL 3300 and JRNL 3300 are cross-listed.

Covering Conflicts: Peace, War, and the Media

Offers an interdisciplinary approach to analyzing international conflict and negotiations: how conflicts evolve, are managed, and/or resolved. In dealing with different types of regional and international conflicts, students focus on historical, ethnic, religious, geographic, and political aspects of a variety of conflicts and the consequences these conflicts hold for regional and international actors.

POLS

ENGL

ENGW

International Conflict and Negotiation

Introduces international law and how it redefines and shapes world politics. Offers students an opportunity to learn about the cornerstones of this area of the law: the state, organizations and their legal personality, diplomatic relations, treaties, extraterritorial jurisdiction, extradition, human rights and humanitarian law, the law of the sea trade/economic law, and international criminal law with a focus on the world courts. Considers the degree to which international law is pervasive in the life of individuals and states alike.

International Law

Explores various types of conflict settlements and their implications for peace and reconciliation. Why do civil wars break out in some places but not others? What does it take to start a revolution? Why do some conflicts last decades, and what can be done to mitigate their costs? Examines why civil conflicts begin, how they are fought, and how they end. Substantive topics include strategies of insurgency and counterinsurgency; the role of ethnicity, religion, and gender; and the relationship between economic factors and conflict. Students leverage fundamental concepts and theories in comparative politics to analyze civil conflicts in a wide range of country contexts. Course Attributes:
NUpath Societies/Institutions, NUpath Writing Intensive

Revolution, Civil War, and Insurrection

Presents an analysis of the goals, methods, and achievements of Russian policy in the post-Soviet era toward Eastern Europe, Western Europe, the Middle East, Central and East Asia, and the United States against the background of Soviet behavior toward these areas in the recent past.

Russian Foreign Policy

Examines how states, institutions, policy choices, and social forces shape—and are influenced by—the global economy and the world polity. Draws on historical patterns and empirical evidence of societal behavior to evaluate the evolution of global development policy over time and across space. Uses country illustrations and case studies to demonstrate how examining development policy trade-offs can provide guidance for formulating sustainable development policies at the global level. Focuses on global governance and how decisions about global rules related to industrial policy, foreign investment policy, and climate change policy are made at the level of several international institutions. 
Course Attributes: NUpath Societies/Institutions

Global Political Economy

Analyzes the history and politics of forced migration, concentrating on the negative “push” factors that force people to migrate and the positive “pull” factors that motivate them to seek sanctuary in particular places. While millons of people worldwide are displaced by war and other forms of violence, the history of forced migration and processes of seeking and granting refuge are often poorly understood. Investigates the development of legal and institutional frameworks that govern forced migration and assesses its political and humanitarian implications. Rejecting dominant views of displaced people as “victims” or as “problems” to “solve,” the course addresses displaced people as complex historical actors whose experiences are tied to legacies and processes of imperialism, state violence, war, and globalization.

Forced Migration: Refugees, Exiles, and Displaced Persons

Explores the processes of social, economic, and cultural change in Latin America. While concentrating on the present, traces class formation, agrarian structures, ethnic identity, ceremonial organization, gender roles, and political conflict since the colonial era in a range of countries. Emphasizes the relationship of communities and national political and economic systems. May emphasize Central America and Mexico or countries in South America through case studies. ANTH 4500 and INTL 4500 are cross-listed. 
Attribute(s): NUpath Interpreting Culture, NUpath Writing Intensive

SOCL

ANTH

HUSV

CRIM

Latin American Society and Development

Introduces students to changes in society and economy in contemporary China. Examines changes in family, gender relations, rural life, work, and international relations. Draws on literature from a range of disciplines including sociology, political science, anthropology, and economics. Cross-listed with ANTH 4520.

Chinese Society and Culture

Offers a senior research and writing seminar that integrates and assesses the knowledge and skills developed by students participating in the international affairs curriculum, including both experiential (co-op, Dialogue of Civilizations, study abroad, internship, or other approved international experience) and classroom-based components. Requires student self-reflection as well as new research, analysis, and writing, which culminate in a final paper and presentation. Topics include contemporary global issues and draw on relevant literature in the disciplines relating to international affairs.

Senior Capstone Seminar in International Affairs

Offers independent work under the direction of members of the department on a chosen topic. Course content depends on instructor. May be repeated without limit.

Directed Study

Serves as an introduction to climate change and development processes in developing countries. Exposes students to key debates in the fields of climate change and international development. Offers students an opportunity to learn about the approaches to climate adaptation, the relationship between adaptation and development, and concepts of resilience and transformation. Using a comparative case study approach, explores the importance of the local context; the intersections of politics, economics, and culture; ecology and human-environment relationships; and the role (and challenges) of finance and development assistance. Climate impacts threaten to reverse many of the development gains of the last century, and the most vulnerable are likely to be the most impacted by climate change. At the same time, opportunities exist to ensure climate-compatible development pathways. Cross-listed with PPUA 5100.

Climate and Development

Explores key environmental challenges and policy solutions from an international perspective. Emphasizes the complexity of human-natural systems for policy design, provides a history of international environmental politics, and discusses contemporary policy issues. Presents key paradigms for understanding environmental challenges and the analytical tools to look critically at important debates, understand the role of different actors, identify equity and justice considerations, and assess policy options from multiple perspectives. Focuses on global environmental governance and sustainable development diplomacy, natural resource management, and climate change policy. Addresses the role of science in policymaking, tensions between environment and development, the scale and complexity of international environmental governance, and equity and justice.

International Environmental Policy

Offers continued thesis supervision by individual members of the program.