Courses

• CAS PO 370: International Conflicts and Cooperation
  Is world politics "winner take all" or mutual gain? Do individuals count? Why do nations expand? Does it pay to fight? How do friends become foes and foes friends? Can swords become plowshares? Can we make a better world? Organizing for peace and human rights.
• CAS PO 372: Making Sense of the World: Conceptual Foundations of International Relations
  (Meets with CAS IR 360.) Introduction to various analytical approaches for understanding the dynamics of global interaction. Explores the variety of "worlds" made visible through the lens of theory. Fosters critical thinking about how conceptual tools shape our understanding of the world and attempted solutions to global problems.
• CAS PO 374: Rise of China
  (Meets with CAS IR 365.) China's political, economic, and strategic development since the late nineteenth century, with emphasis on the period since 1949. Examines three questions: In what ways is China rising? How did it happen? What are the impacts of China's rise on the U.S. and the global system?
• CAS PO 375: Russian and Post-Soviet Foreign Relations
  Decisive factors in the foreign relations of Russia and the other former Soviet republics, including historical continuity and change, survival and change of ideology, domestic politics, economic and geographical factors, military and external political considerations. The future of arms control, nuclear weapons, the economy, and relations among the former republics are also examined.
• CAS PO 378: International Relations of South Asia
  Meets with CAS IR 372. Introduction to South Asia and regional conflict and cooperation. Focus on India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka inter-state relations; great power interventions; power distributions; norms; political, military, and economic conflict and cooperation.
• CAS PO 382: Europe and International Relations
  Meets with CAS IR 250. Provides an overview European affairs. Topics include the foreign policies of European nations, the dynamics of European integration, NATO, international migration and ethnic conflict, and European relations with the United States, Russia, and neighboring countries.
• CAS PO 383: Understanding Modern North Africa
  Meets with CAS IR 383. Considers political, cultural, economic, and social developments in the modern states of Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, and Libya as they struggle to gain independence from colonial domination and to consolidate viable, secure, and legitimate states and prosperous national communities.
• CAS PO 384: Southeast Asia in World Politics
  Meets with CAS IR 369. Examines Southeast Asia as an important emerging political, economic, and security region in world politics. Background materials, including the region's history, cultural diversity, and geo-strategic position, are given weight in the course.
• CAS PO 385: Global Governance and International Organization
  Meets with CAS IR 373. Provides an overview of major theoretical perspectives on the creation and function of international organizations, comparative case studies of selected organizations, and an examination of present and future roles of international organizations in selected issue areas.
• CAS PO 391: Classical to Early Modern Political Theory
  A text-oriented study of the principal political ideas of Plato, Aristotle, St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, and Machiavelli.
• CAS PO 392: Modern Political Theory
  Intensive study of the political philosophy of Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Mill, Marx, and Nietzsche. Classes are generally a combination of lecture and discussion but also include formal debates, guest lectures, and films.
• CAS PO 395: The European Enlightenment
  Survey of the intellectual and social transformation of Europe from the 1680s to the French Revolution. Readings draw on both eighteenth-century sources (including Voltaire, Diderot, Condorcet, Lessing, Smith, and Hume) and recent work by historians. Also offered as CAS HI 215.
• CAS PO 401: Independent Work in Political Science
  Open to upper division concentrators. Students have a minimum GPA of 3.2 with a 3.4 in the concentration plus the ability to do independent work in the judgement of the concentration faculty advisor.
• CAS PO 402: Independent Work in Political Science
  Open to upper division concentrators. Students have a minimum GPA of 3.2 with a 3.4 in the concentration plus the ability to do independent work in the judgement of the concentration faculty advisor.
• CAS PO 411: Conflict and Conflict Resolution in Latin America
  Meets with CAS IR 411. Examines a range of historical and contemporary conflicts and wars in Latin America, both internal and regional, examining their causes and consequences, and the most important factors that explain how they were resolved or why they persist.
• CAS PO 491: Directed Study in Political Science
  
• CAS PO 492: Directed Study in Political Science
  
• CAS PO 502: Political Analysis: A Primer
  (This course may be used for elective credit only.) The logic and methods of empirical analysis in political science. Includes discussion of experimental, observational, ehtnographic, and mass survey research designs. Recommended for students pursuing Work for Distinction or considering graduate work in political science.
• CAS PO 509: Latin American Political Parties
  Meets with CAS IR 502. Parties and party systems of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru, and Venezuela. Historical origins and labor incorporation. Populist, working-class, and hegemonic parties. Market reform and party system transformation or collapse. Ethnic parties, clientelism, rise of a new Left.
• CAS PO 510: American Politics and the Separation of Powers
  Examines inter-institutional dynamics in the American system of separated powers. Explicit focus on the relationships between the president, Congress, and judiciary, and on the strategies each employs to affect political outputs.

Back to full list of College of Arts & Sciences