This course focuses on warfare and forms of violent conflict around the world, and in doing so students will investigate key dimensions of how war is changing, the role of state and non-state armed actors, the intersection of warfare with terrorism and criminality, the role of new technologies in warfare, its mediatization and the gendered impacts of warfare.

In a period of dramatic global change, the pursuit of security occurs as new rivalries emerge within the nation-state system and as new threats suggest thorough changes in that system itself. The post-cold war period has given rise to a series of immense challenges, with new forms of warfare intersecting with criminality and terrorism and an increasingly amplified role of non-state actors leading to enduring conflicts. At its core is the question of why violence in the form of warfare occurs, while other key social dynamics-such as mass urbanization and climate change-impact future trajectories of violence.

While this course will be of key interest to students focusing on security, it will also provide critical groundwork for those who wish to develop skills and knowledge for humanitarian, peacebuilding and development contexts, diplomacy and foreign affairs, and those who have a general interest in global politics.