Admission requirements
This course is part of the minor Public Risk and Disaster, taught at The Hague by a lecturer from Leiden University. The course can only be taken within the framework of participation in the minor PRD.
Description
Many areas of the world experiencing political instability might raise a complex set of issues and problems both in the region and more widely. The geo-political area of the Sahel region, including Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Mauritania and Chad, has been experiencing multiple and diverse insecurities, from socio-economic challenges and climate variability, to transnational terrorism and cross-border illicit trafficking. This course will provide a focus into the different regional challenges and how they interact, generating implications at national, regional and international level. Indeed, once a region that rarely featured in debates about global security, the Sahel has become increasingly topical in the current policy debate, especially in Europe, because of the connection between socio-economic issues, climate change and security challenges. By exploring the multiple levels of the Sahel ‘crisis’, students will learn how to understand different security dynamics in terms of contextual and explanatory factors, as well as evaluate implications for governments, citizens, and other actors. Students will specifically learn to analyze an event, or set of interrelated events, and gain the ability to apply this skill in other cases.
Course objectives
This course will:
offer an introduction to an often-misunderstood region, whose issues and prospects go beyond war, coups and poverty, and whose internal developments impact many other actors (neighboring areas, foreign powers, international organizations);
introduce students to regional approaches to security and analyse key challenges that are expected to grow in the next decades;
understand and analyze instability as a multifaceted phenomenon;
understand and integrate concepts and methods from relevant disciplines in order to gain a deeper understanding of a real-life security case.
Timetable
On the right side of programme front page of the studyguide you will find links to the website and timetables, uSis and Brightspace.
Mode of instruction
7 lectures and self-study
Assessment method
Group Mid-Term:
30% of final grade
Grade must be 5.50 or higher
Resit is not possible
Grade can be compensated
Individual Final:
70% of final grade
Grade must be 5.50 or higher
Resit of a fail is possible.
Resit will take the same form
Reading list
The reading list and programme will be made available on Brightspace
Registration
To be announced by OSC staff.
Contact
Silvia D’Amato, s.damato@fgga.leidenuniv.nl