International Cooperation INTS 401a

Fall 2010
Time: Monday 3.30 - 5.20 pm Location: RKZ 02

Instructor: Nikolay Marinov
e-mail: nikolay.marinov@yale.edu

Office Location: Rosenkranz Hall 407 Office Hours: Tuesday 1.30 pm - 3 pm

• Course Description:

International relations are often said to be in a state of ‘anarchy’, understood as a state or system in which no central authority exists to enforce contracts and implement or- der. The question we will pose is: how can order, cooperation, and peace emerge under conditions of anarchy? We start the course by asking theoretical questions about the emergence of cooperation under anarchy. We continue by probing funda- mental questions about the effects of institutions (formal and informal) on behavior, the construction of institutions, the durability and form of international organizations.

• Requirements and Grading: Grades for the course will be based on participation (25%), and a midterm (25%), final exams (25%), and draft research design (25 %) due at the conclusion of the course (end of finals week). Participation consists of class attendance, brief occasional assignments (policy position papers of 2 pages or less) for students to post on the classes server, completion of the readings, taking part in discussion. (Yes, participation does count - lack of discussion may lower your grade while active discussion may increase it.) Students can download the midterm from classesv2⇒Resources any time between noon on October 4th and noon on October 11th and should upload the completed essay(s) to their dropboxes no later than 3 hours after the chosen download time. Please name your midterm “studentlastname midterm international cooperation.” The same applies to the final, except that you will have 5 hours to turn it in and the window of opportunity for download is noon, December 9th to noon, December 18th. Both exams are closed book and will involve writing one or more short essays.