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  3. Global Environmental Politics

Global Environmental Politics (POLS30022)

Undergraduate level 3Points: 12.5On Campus (Parkville)

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Overview

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Semester 2
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This subject provides a comprehensive and critical introduction to global environmental politics. It introduces the ethical, political and institutional challenges raised by the global environmental crisis and the key policy and institutional responses. The subject critically explores the environmental treaty system, the role of the United Nations, and the complex relationship between global environmental and economic governance. The role of key non-state actors will also be examined, including the diverse and often competing claims of the modern environment movement and its critics and the changing practices of corporations. Key global debates about sustainable development, environmental justice and ecological security will be explored through a range of topics and case studies, including the idea of the 'ecological footprint' and the problem of over-consumption, the global politics of climate change, the relationship between trade and environment, the precautionary principle and the politics of risk. Questions of gender and ethnicity are explicitly addressed in the syllabus.

Intended learning outcomes

On completion of this subject students should:


  • Understand and critically compare the competing frameworks for understanding global environmental politics within mainstream international relations theory and the more critical field of global political ecology;

  • demonstrate a broad understanding of the diverse ideological character and claims of the modern environment movement and the major lines of political contestation in the broader global environmental debate;

  • recognise the major environment and development tensions and debates within the national, international and global communities, particularly the sustainable development debate and the tensions between environmental and economic global governance;

  • be able to identify the different ways in which new environmental issues, actors, interests and agendas have challenged the basic norms and institutions of global governance, particularly the system of sovereign states, environmental multilateralism, and the norms and institutions of global economic governance;

  • be able to evaluate critically the different global institutional responses to global ecological problems;

  • Communicate effectively in oral and written formats.

Last updated: 11 December 2024