Entry requirements

Fulfilment of the requirements for a Bachelor's degree with a social science subject as the main field of study.

Learning outcomes

The course is designed to provide students with both a solid academic grounding in the relevant theories, and cases, as well as knowledge and skills that will have practical value.

After completion of this course the student is expected to be able to:

• Independently and critically analyse emerging security challenges.
• Independently identify research problems and relevant practical-policy issues in the subject area.
• Critically present state-of-the-art reviews and overviews of recent research findings in the subject area.
• With good scientific insight and the required methodological skills: collect, organise, analyse, and draw appropriate conclusions for the theory and practice in the subject area.
• Independently design and carry out a report-writing task, within the specified time limit, in the subject area.
• Be able to asses the works of others from a wide theoretical and practical perspective in the subject area.
• See the connections, interactions, influences, and interdependence between various security threats, both traditional and emerging ones.

Content

The on-going wave of globalisation has changed the character of threats to human, national and international security. The present security discourse stands in major contrast to the traditional realist understanding of security that prevailed during the Cold War. After the fall of the Berlin Wall and with the shifting of international political environment, a broader concept of security began to gain acceptance, which includes socio-economic-environmental challenges. The aim of this course is to familiarise students with these newly emerging theories and themes in security studies. The course examines the causes of these new non-military threats like climate change, food and health security and global migration issues with a focus on practical measures to address them. This course provides sophisticated insights into both traditional and emergent perspectives on security studies. The course helps to expose the students to a comprehensive overview of the new security discussion, establishing the case for the broader agenda. In additional to theory, a number of empirical studies of emerging new threats to global security are presented and analysed.

Instruction

The course is given in the form of lectures and various types of seminars.

Assessment

The examination of the course will be twofold:

(1) Active participation during the seminars and, most importantly,

(2) A final written essay.

The following grades are used: Pass with distinction (VG), Pass (G), Fail (U).

Two dates to resubmit the final paper are offered every year the course is given.

If there are special reasons for doing so, an examiner may make an exception from the method of assessment indicated and allow a student to be assessed by another method. An example of special reasons might be a certificate regarding special pedagogical support from the University's disability coordinator.