POLS 285 — Introduction to International Relations

Fall 2024 | M/W 2:00-3:15pm | DuSable 228

Modified

September 5, 2024

Key Course Info

TOPIC: This is an introduction to the political science subfield of international relations.
MODALITY: This is an in-person course. We meet Monday and Wednesdays from 2-3:15 in DuSable 228.
CREDITS: 3 credit hours. The course counts toward the general education distributive studies requirement for the social sciences. It also counts toward the 200-level breadth requirement for all Political Science majors.
ASSESSMENTS: Major assessments consist of two exams and a policy memo submitted in two drafts. In addition, there are weekly reading quizzes.
PREREQUISITES: None! Students at all levels and from all majors are encouraged to enroll!
MATERIALS: No textbook purchases are required.

Instructor

Dr. Ches Thurber

414 Zulauf Hall
cthurber@niu.edu
Office Hours: M/T 9:30 - 11:00 am
Schedule an appointment

Teaching Assistants

Ernest Kwofie

Ph.D. Candidate
eplangekwofie@niu.edu

Ijeoma Ezeora

Ph.D. Candidate
iezeora@niu.edu

What is this course about?

Russia appears on the brink of invading Ukraine. North Korea continues to develop its nuclear arsenal, while Iran may be headed toward developing its own. Meanwhile, global climate change poses a catastrophic threat to the planet, while global actors seem unable to do anything in response. This class seeks to address why global cooperation can be so difficult even if most of the world shares similar goals of peace and prosperity. To do so, we will try to use the tools of social “science” to analyze both historical events and contemporary challenges. We will discuss issues ranging from war and peace to economic development, and from transnational migration to global health.

What will you learn in this course?

You will come away from the course with a set of analytic frameworks and a depth of historical knowledge that will enable you to better understand current issues in global politics and empower you to participate in the process of crafting solutions, whether that be as a future policymaker, an issue-advocate, or an engaged global citizen.

In the liberal arts tradition, I am interested not just in the topical knowledge you acquire, but the skills you develop that you will use in your professional careers and as engaged public citizens. You will work on expressing yourself effectively in writing and in public speaking, on crafting logical arguments, and using evidence to support your arguments. You will develop your research skills using a combination of traditional, online, and AI tools.

How will the class run?

This will be an in-person class with required attendance. The class will combine lectures, discussions, and simulation activities. Mondays will lean a little more toward lecture, while Wednesdays will start with a discussion or writing activity led by the teaching assistant. In addition to weekly readings, you will take a weekly reading quiz on Blackboard.

Stay on track!

Attendance and active participation in class discussions is required. It is essential that you come to class having completed the readings and ready to participate in discussion every class period.

How can you contact me?

Please feel free to email me or the course teaching assistants at any time. We will try to respond within about 24 hours during the week. I will be holding office hours on Mondays and Tuesdays between 9:30 and 11:00am. I strongly encourage you to take advantage of this! Sign up for an appointment at this link. Enter your NIU email address and Calendly will automatically set up a Zoom meeting for the two of us at the time that you selected.

What Materials Do You Need?

All required readings for this course will be posted on Blackboard. We will use the following free, open-source textbook:

Stephen McGlinchey (ed.), International Relations. Bristol: E-International Relations, 2017. Available online here.

Students looking for further support may wish to consult the following optional textbook in addition to or in lieu of the required text. It’s a better textbook, but it costs money. You may be able to find older versions for cheap online, or you might be able to check it out from a library:

Mingst and McKibben, Essentials of International Relations Norton 2021.

Evaluation

Class Attendance and Participation (20%): The time we spend in class is for me the most important of this course. As such, punctual attendance is mandatory. But more important than just being present at a desk is that you are actively engaged. I expect that you have done the readings and that you try to participate in discussion each and every class section. You may miss up to 2 classes during the course of the semester without penalty. Beyond that, I ask that you write a brief 1-page summary of the readings assigned for the missed day as make-up work to receive attendance credit. Make-up reading summaries are due by the beginning of the next class.

Reading Quizzes (10%): For each week of the course, there will be an online multiple choice quiz on the readings and video lectures. The quizzes are open-book and open-note. Students will be able to re-take the quiz one time. Quizzes must be complete by the start of class on Wednesday.

Writing Assignment: (25%) You will write one 1,000-word policy memo. You will submit an initial draft for grading (10%) and then revise the draft based on instructor feedback for a second (higher) grade (15%).

Exams: (40%) You will have two exams in this course, a midterm and a final. They will occur in class on the days indicated later in this syllabus.

Final Simulation: (5%) We will use our scheduled final exam period to hold a final simulation activity. Your preparation and participation in that simulation will be graded.

Extra Credit: I will highlight several on-campus and online events pertaining to international relations that students can attend/watch and submit a 1-page response memo. Doing so will earn 5 extra points on that week’s reading quiz. Please note that while extra credit may be helpful to your final grade, it is a poor substitute for doing the main assignments.

What should you do if you are falling behind?

While it is extremely important that you stick to the weekly schedule of this class, I recognize that stuff happens. The most important thing is that you communicate with me about your needs. I respect your privacy and will never ask you for personal details of your situation.

If you think you need to delay submitting a written assignment or taking an exam, please talk to me in advance, and I will do my best to accommodate. Any missed exam or written assignment submitted after the deadline without prior authorization will incur a penalty. If you do miss an assignment, still reach out and we will come up with a plan for getting you back on track. There will be a late penalty, but it will be far better than failing to turn in an assignment altogether.

If you fall behind … reach out!

Reaching out is the most important thing you can do if you are falling behind. It is natural to feel embarrassed and try to avoid the situation. But this is the worst thing you can do in terms of your success in this course. If you reach out, I will respect your privacy, will not pass judgment, and will work with your to come up with a game plan to get you back on track

Letter Grade Distribution

Percentage	Letter Grade
> 93.00	A
90.00 - 92.99	A-
87.00-89.99	B+
83.00 - 86.99	B
80.00 - 82.99	B-
77.00-79.99	C+
70.00 - 76.99	C
60.00 - 69.99	D
< 60.00	F

Course Policies

Committed to your success: Beyond all else, I am committed to the success of every student in this class. I encourage everyone in the class to reach out to me if there is anything I can do in terms of the delivery of the course that would help you be more successful. I might not always be able to make it happen, but I will never discourage you from asking.
Names and Pronouns: I ask that my undergraduate students refer to me as either Dr. or Professor Thurber. I’m just old-school that way. If you have deep ideological opposition to the hierarchy of academic titles, I will also respond to “Comrade Thurber.” I usually use the he/him/his pronouns to refer to myself, but am equally comfortable being referred to with they/them/their. Please let me know how you prefer to be addressed, both in name and pronoun, especially if it differs from what is in the college directory. I will make every effort to address you in the way you wish to be addressed. Please try and do the same for your fellow classmates, as well as for other faculty in the department.
Americans with Disabilities Act and Non-Discrimination Statement: If you need an accommodation for this class, please contact the Disability Resource Center as soon as possible. The DRC coordinates accommodations for students with disabilities. It is located on the 4th floor of the Health Services Building, and can be reached at 815-753-1303 or drc@niu.edu. Also, please contact me privately as soon as possible so we can discuss your accommodations. Please note that you will not be required to disclose your disability, only your accommodations. The sooner you let me know your needs, the sooner I can assist you in achieving your learning goals in this course.
Mental Health and Well-being: I understand that college students may experience a range of academic, social, and personal stressors, which can be overwhelming. You are not alone. Well-being at NIU offers resources, programs, and services. If you or someone you know need assistance with comprehensive or crisis mental health support, Counseling and Consultation Services (CCS) at 815-753-1206 is ready to help 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Additionally, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline can be reached at 988.
Academic Integrity: Good academic work must be based on honesty. The attempt of any student to present as his or her own work that which he or she has not produced is regarded by the faculty and administration as a serious offense. Students are considered to have cheated if they copy the work of another during an examination or turn in a paper or an assignment written, in whole or in part, by someone else. Students are guilty of plagiarism, intentional or not, if they copy material from books, magazines, or other sources without identifying and acknowledging those sources or if they paraphrase ideas from such sources without acknowledging them. Students guilty of, or assisting others in, either cheating or plagiarism on an assignment, quiz, or examination may receive a grade of F for the course involved and may be suspended or dismissed from the university.

This is an issue I take seriously. Unfortuntely, it has increasingly become an issue in my courses. The creation of one’s own original work is the core of what a university education is all about. Falsely claiming credit for words or ideas that are not your own undermines that core. I will use software that tracks plagiarism as well as for similarities with classmates’ or even your own prior work. When work looks suspicious, I will often use additional measures to identify the original sources of plagiarized text. In this course, academic dishonesty will always result in an F on the assignment and a formal misconduct report filed with the university. The recommendation I make in that report (e.g. failure from the course, suspension, expulsion from the university) will depend on the circumstance.
Artificial Intelligence: Generative artificial intelligence (AI) is almost certainly going to become an essential tool in the workplace and society. Used well and in combination with strong critical thinking and writing skills, it may be able to help you be a better student and professional. The challenge then becomes learning how to use it well and how to develop those critical thinking and writing skills in an AI world.

To this end, I will provide explicit instructions for each assignment as to whether and how AI may be used. Violation of these rules will be considered academic dishonesty. In any case in which the use of AI is permitted, students will be asked to:
- Thoroughly read and verify the content of each submission. AI tools frequently produce output that contains factual errors, poor arguments, and even plagiarized content. Students will be held responsible for any errors in their submitted work that comes from AI sources;
- Explain how AI was used in the coursework, with citation as appropriate;
- Consider that AI models incorporate the social biases present in the underlying texts from which they are trained.

Class Schedule

Students are expected to read the listed readings before the indicated class session.

Topic	Assignments
Week 1: The Problem of Trust	Mon 8/23: Simulation Activity Syllabus Wed 8/25: No Class Optional: Trust Game Schelling, “Confidence in Crisis” Ho, “Disney’s Raya and the Economics of Trust” Crowley, “Why the White House is Reading Greek History” Lecture Video: The Problem of Trust Reading Quiz
Week 2: Approaches to the Study of IR	Mon 9/2: Labor Day - No Class Wed 9/4: POLSapalooza: Cole Hall Patio Mattis, “On Reading” Green, “How to Read Political Science” McGlinchey, “Getting Started” Ringmar, “Making of the Modern World” Lecture Videos Reading Quiz
Week 3: Levels of Analysis	Mon 9/9: Levels of Analysis Gebhard, “One World, Many Actors” Wed 9/11: The War in Ukraine Carpenter, “The U.S. and NATO Helped Trigger the Ukraine War” Linden and Wilkes, “Putin: The Psychology Behind His Dangerous Leadership” Reading Quiz
Week 4: The Paradigms of IR	Mon 9/16: The Paradigms Gold and McGlinchey, “International Relations Theory” Wed 9/18: World Wars Nye, “The Failure of Collective Security and WWII” Reading Quiz (Due before Wed. class)
Week 5: A More Global IR	Mon 9/23: Gender Shepherd on Cynthia Enloe Cohn, “Gender and National Security” Wed 9/25: Race Bhambra et al, “Why is Mainstream IR Blind to Racism?” Reading Quiz
Week 6: War and Peace	Mon 9/30: Modern Warfare CFR, “How is Conflict Changing?” CFR, “What is Interstate Conflict?” CFR, “How do Countries Decide Whether to Go to War?” Wed 10/2: The US-China Rivalry Mearsheimer, “The Inevitable Rivalry” Ikenberry, “A Rivalry of America’s Making” and other replies to JJM Reading Quiz
Week 7: Diplomacy, Foreign Policy, and Statecraft	Mon 10/7: Diplomacy McGlinchey, “Diplomacy” Wed 10/9: Policymaking CFR, U.S. Foreign Policy Baker et al, “Inside Trump’s Aborted Attack on Iran” Policy Memo Draft Due
Week 8: Global Governance	Mon 10/14: International Law Traisback, “International Law” Wed 10/16: International Organizations Abidin, “International Organizations” Reading Quiz
Week 9: Midterm Week	Mon 10/21: Review Day Wed: 10/23: Midterm Exam
Week 10: Global Finance	Mon 10/28: Bretton Woods Reading TBD Wed 10/30: Monetary Policy CFR, “Monetary Policies and Currencies” Reading Quiz
Week 11: Trade and Development	Mon 11/4: International Trade CFR, “Trade” Wed 11/6: Global Development Reading TBD No Reading Quiz this week
Week 12: Environment and Global Health	Mon 11/11: Environmental Politics Pacheco-Vega, “The Environment” CFR, “Climate Change” Wed 11/13: Global Health Markel, “Worldly Approaches to Global Health” CFR, “Covid-19” Reading Quiz
Week 13: Global Civil Society and Human Rights	Mon 11/18: Transnational Activism Marchetti, “Global Civil Society” Hanes, “Voices of the People” Chenoweth, “3.5% Rule” Wed 11/20: Global Migration CFR, “Migration” Reading Quiz
Week 14: Thanksgiving Holiday	Mon 11/25: TBD Revised Policy Memo Due Wed 11/27: No Class - Thanksgiving Holiday
Week 15: Last Week of Classes	Mon 12/2: Exam Review Wed 12/4: Final Exam
Finals Week	Mon 12/9: Final Simulation 2:00-3:50pm