MODULES
Year 1
CORE MODULES
Forced Migration in the Global Era
As part of this module you will critically examine key issues associated with forced migration and the refugee experience. It will engage you with evaluation of the socio-political processes of construction and production of a range of categories labelling people on the move: forced migrant, refugee, asylum seeker, irregular migrant etc. This will enable you to develop your intellectual position on important contemporary issues ranging from human rights, securitization of migration and their global and local dimensions, such as protracted displacement, to the processes of inclusion, exclusion and identity politics in receiving societies.
By completing this module, you will be able to evidence both the crucial level of relevant knowledge as well as critical thinking skills required for future engagement in evidence-based assessment and evaluation of the situation of marginalised and vulnerable groups in society - something future employers will look for in your portfolio.
Research Methods for Social Science
This module equips students with an understanding of how to take up and use a range of research methods to inform evidence based policy making with a view to them putting these into action to enhance their employability.
Independent Applied Research Project
This module consolidates the knowledge acquired and skills developed in earlier modules intended to prepare you to execute a piece of independent and original work. The module aims to support you in the research and development process suitable for conducting an appropriately managed project, whilst improving your research skills and refining your ability to use them productively. It also aims to help you to offer evidence of self-management in respect of planning, recording and evaluation within the original work produced.
OPTIONAL MODULES
Introduction to Conflict, Displacement and Human Security
- To familiarise students with key aspects of contemporary conflicts, changing dynamics of displacement and increased human insecurity.
- To adopt a comprehensive approach to the understanding of the intersection of conflict, displacement, human security and development.
- To place emphasis on people as social actors and agents of social change.
- To examine strategies to prevent conflicts and to promote reconciliation and peace-building.
International Human Rights
This module aims to provide an overview of human rights international human rights, their enforcement mechanisms and the contexts in which they are implemented. The module juxtaposes the conceptual and normative framework for international protection of rights with the prospects and strategies for their realisation through a range of methods both formal and informal and by the agency of diverse actors. The module critiques universal and regional human rights regimes as well as domestic approaches through examination of a range of human rights issues. Throughout the module, emphasis will be placed on examining the procedural and substantive provisions to examine good practices and testing tools and strategies.
War and Human Rights
- You will consider the nature and development of contemporary armed conflicts, followed by an analysis of the constraints that international humanitarian law and human rights law place upon actors in both internal and international armed conflict.
- You will consider the increase of internal armed conflicts and the participation of non-state actors, mainly armed groups, and the challenges for the application of international law in such contexts.
- You will study the scope and effects of the human rights violations committed in the context of contemporary armed conflicts and their legal qualification.
- You will consider the responses that have been taken in the wake of armed conflict to punish violations of human rights law and international humanitarian law, through prosecutions and other procedures at international level, including the ad hoc tribunals, hybrid tribunal and the International Criminal Court, and also in domestic courts of countries that have experienced conflict and distant countries.
International Refugee Law
This module aims to provide an overview of contemporary international protection framework and practice relating to refugees and Internally Displaced Persons. It explores the theoretical, philosophical, political and socio-cultural dimensions of the refugee crisis from an interdisciplinary perspective. The module focuses on the global and regional institutional mechanisms redressing human rights violations through case studies. It also discusses domestic application of international refugee standards by reviewing the legislative developments in the field of UK Immigration and Refugee practice and policy trends in Europe: and its impact on domestic refugee policy.
Global Development Now
This core module will introduce you to the current debates in development. It situates global development within the key literatures in development theory and its critiques, helping you to examine the implications for contemporary development debates. It enables you to engage with and apply the informed practitioner focused skills to problems in global development.
Global Environmental Politics
To develop an in-depth and critical understanding of the theoretical debates, institutional processes and political practices associated with the international politics of the environment and environmental change and the ways this is contested and represented in the media and by social movements.
