30594 - GEOPOLITICS: HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY AND POWER DYNAMICS

Background knowledge is not necessary

Geopolitics focuses on the spatial dimensions of power and in particular on States’ policies and strategies designed to establish and secure control over areas and resources. Geopolitics studies the dynamics of the establishment of spheres of influence at the international level, and has close relations with disciplines as geography and international relations. The World’s geopolitical multiple equilibria are continuously evolving and recombining, making political geography also a field concerned with the longitudinal, historical dimension. The Twentieth century has witnessed an outstanding acceleration in the transformations in the World’s geopolitical framework, starting from the break-up of the old geopolitical order precedent the Great War, the rise of new powers, the Cold War, until the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Today, the global geopolitical order is again under radical transformation. In the meantime, new concepts of spaces are enriching the scenario, revolutionising the policies that polities put in place in order to secure their control to their own advantage. The course gives an overview of the key issues in contemporary geopolitics placing them within a broad historical context, and also focuses on critical areas and players.

Part 1: Introduction and basic concepts:

• Introduction to geopolitics.
• The history of Geopolitical thought.
• Global Geopolitics in the 20th century.
• The cultural and political dimension of geopolitics.

Part 2: Current topics in geopolitics:

• World geopolitics in the 21st centuries.
• Topic 1: Geopolitics of Space
• Topic 2: Geopolitics of Natural Resources
• Topic 3: New dimensions of Geopolitics

At the end of the course student will be able to...

• Better evaluate the status of the current geopolitical equilibria.

At the end of the course student will be able to...

• Understand the future evolution and transformation patterns of geopolitical strategies of World's countries.

• Face-to-face lectures
• Online lectures
• Guest speaker's talks (in class or in distance)
• Case studies /Incidents (traditional, online)
• Individual assignments
• Group assignments
• Interactive class activities on campus/online (role playing, business game, simulation, online forum, instant polls)

The course is mostly interactive in different ways, including lectures and seminars by professionals and researchers, both online and in presence.

Face to face lectures  are the standard of the course and convey theoretical concepts

Online lectures are useful in case of discussios with speakers in distant locations

Guest speakers seminars are to be held mainly in class and are useful to discuss practical cases

Case discussion are necessary to actually understand the behavior of political actors in critical situations

Individual and group assigments are necessary to clarify some issues of general interest or comment on current events

Interactive activities will be used mainly to verify the degree of preparation of students during the course

Attending students: will take a partial (first part) and a final (second part) exam, written in the form of open questions. Each partial exam counts for the 50% of the final grade. Students may optionally earn additional points (up to 2) writing a short (up to 2000 words) individual essay about a topic agreed with the professor, after the first partial. The essay must be emailed in the same day of the final exam.

Non attending students: will take a final exam, written in the form of open questions. The final grade will consist of the result of the exam (50%), and on the review (min 3,000 words) of one additional book decided with the instructor (50%).

Readings indicated by the instructors and class slides

Readings plus a 15 pages review of a book indicated by the instructor, and slides of the course