Globalisation: Politics, Conflict and Human Rights MA (PGCert PGDip)

International equivalencies

We can help you meet our English language or academic entry requirements.

Course structure

On the Globalisation: Politics, Conflict and Human Rights MA, you will:

• study key developments and issues in relation to politics, conflict and human rights.
• consider these areas within the context of contemporary globalisation
• be encouraged to develop an informed and critical understanding of contemporary globalisation
• receive close tutorial support.
• be able to pursue a wide range of careers as well as opportunities for further postgraduate research.

The programme is founded on the notion that politics, conflict and human rights must now be understood in the context of contemporary globalisation.

Modules

Globalisation and Global Politics

This module begins by examining a range of approaches to globalisation and global politics before exploring the processes, institutions and ideologies that are widely considered to be driving them. For example, economic globalisation is studied in relation to the financial crisis of 2008 and wider debates about global economic disorder. In particular, the emphasis is on fostering an informed understanding of contemporary globalisation through study of critical theories, debates about power, patterns of global poverty and inequality, and development responses.

In relation to claims about a shift in global power, the rise of China and its implications for the Asia-Pacific Region and the rest of the world are explored.  At an institutional level, the Human Rights Council, the International Criminal Court and the European Court of Human Rights are examined. The politics of global sustainability is considered in relation to the formation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Finally, the politics of a transnational/global movement is investigated through the study of La Via Campesina.

Conflict, Security and Human Rights

This module examines contemporary conflict, security and human rights debates in relation to globalisation and the evolution of global politics.  Areas and issues examined include: the relationship between global security and international relations theory; conflict resolution theory and the prospects of conflict resolution in Syria; state building and peace-building in Somalia; and a global NGO (Amnesty International) dedicated to monitoring conflict and human rights abuses.

Environmental security is considered within the context of global environmental decline, focusing in particular on Moscow’s apparent resource-based approach to international relations. As for human rights, the major theories and critiques are examined, with specific reference to humanitarian intervention and the emergence of the concept of human security. In this vein, the politics of movement under contemporary globalisation is explored by studying the Geneva Convention and the rights of refugees.

Modules

• Globalisation and Global Politics
• Conflict, Security and Human Rights
• Research Methods
• Dissertation

Two from:

• Human Rights and Humanitarian Intervention
• Cultural and Critical Theory (International Relations Theory)
• Global Environmental Politics
• Conflict Resolution and the Irish Troubles
• Legacies of Warfare
• Global Ethics
• A Learning and Teaching option

Staff profile

Dr Paul Hopper – Senior lecturer

Dr Paul Hopper has been a member of staff at the University of Brighton since the early 1990s, before which he taught sociology and social and political philosophy at the University of Sussex. He leads the Globalisation, Politics and Culture MA and the Globalisation, Politics and Culture BA(Hons), and has developed option modules such as Race and Racism and the Sociology of Globalisation for undergraduate programmes.

Paul's research interests revolve around globalisation, especially in relation to: culture, communication and identity; global movements and networks; global governance; development; and the environment. He is concerned with how globalising processes are both informing and being informed by these areas. His work seeks to move beyond general and abstract accounts of this subject, focusing instead upon how globalising processes are interpreted and experienced within specific contexts.

In substantiating this position, Paul has undertaken a series of case studies as part of his research, ranging from examining how globalisation has informed debates within the Islamic world to how the Chinese party-state has for reasons of political expediency used economic globalisation but resisted its cultural and political dimensions. This research has been published in several books, including Rebuilding Communities in an Age of Individualism (Ashgate, 2003), Living with Globalization (Berg, 2006), Understanding Cultural Globalization (Polity, 2007), Understanding Development (Polity, 2012) and Understanding Global Environmental Politics (Polity, 2009).

Dr Robin Dunford – Course leader 

Dr Robin Dunford has been a member of staff at the University of Brighton since 2014, before which he taught politics at the University of Exeter and an MA in Human Rights at the University of Leicester. He leads the Globalisation, Politics and Conflict MA and the Globalisation: Politics History and Culture BA (Hons). He has a wide range of teaching expertise, with specialist areas including human rights, contemporary conflict and insecurity, global ethics, and the global politics of food and agriculture.

Robin’s research has focused on transnational peasant resistance to land ‘grabbing’, with particular reference to activism around peasant’s rights and food sovereignty. He has written a book on The Politics of Transnational Peasant Struggle, and has had articles on the process of drafting a UN declaration on the rights of peasants and other people on rural areas published in top International Relations journals. 

His research also concerns the causes of conflict and insecurity, with particular reference to the implications that the multiple, complex, and globalised causes of conflict have for conflict avoidance on the one hand and normative and strategic justifications of international military intervention on the other.

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Campus where this course is taught

Accommodation

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Accommodation

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