Course descriptionInternational Relations BA Honours.
Course summary:
This course enables you to develop a comprehensive understanding of the evolution of the international system, and to relate this to contemporary developments in international relations. It provides a theoretical framework for understanding the international system and the distribution of power at the global, regional and national levels.
You will focus particularly on the changing dynamics of international security and the challenges of state building within contemporary international relations. This course is linked to the internationally renowned Security and International Relations research programme in the Department of Politics and International Relations.
With excellent links to employers, this course offers you the opportunity to advance your knowledge of international relations in an applied setting. You will also gain the transferable and cognitive skills necessary for lifelong personal and professional development.
Our graduates go on to develop careers in various sectors, including the Civil Service, NGOs, international organisations such as the EU or UN, policy and research, teaching, journalism, and politics.
Our teaching programme is structured to support your transition to higher education, with the first year designed to immerse you in key concepts, case studies and questions in politics, international relations and development studies. In the second year you will be encouraged to think about the global dimensions of international security, examining the contemporary challenges to states, citizens and the globe in the post-Cold War era. You will be encouraged to think imaginatively about ideas in international relations, especially as it relates to the geopolitics of states, regions and territories within world politics today. In your third year, you will examine the ways in which sovereignty has been transformed through recent debates about human rights, humanitarian intervention, ethics, and state responsibility within the new era of global politics.
Teaching and learning includes small group work, problem-based tutorials, review sessions, workshops, symposia, debates, Q&A sessions, document analysis sessions, and structured role-plays.
A wide range of assessments includes essays, exams, policy reports, project work, individual and group presentations, blogs, posters, and debates.
The teaching is offered within the Department of Politics and International Relations. We are in the centre of one of the world’s greatest cities and we use this vibrant, multicultural setting to ensure that our students discover innovative solutions to the problems facing our world. In 2016 the University of Westminster was named the most diverse university in the UK, representing 169 nationalities. As a department we also host the world-renowned Centre for the Study of Democracy. The Centre undertakes research across a range of critical challenges to the theory and practice of politics and international relations. We have an innovative initiative called the Democratic Education Network that facilitates dialogue and the sharing of knowledge between our students, international universities and diasporic communities in London.