Political Science 4881
INTERNATIONAL
LAW

Fall 1999
BLEGEN 425
Professor Richard Price
1478 Social Sciences
Office Hours: Mon 12:00 - 1:00; Fri 2:15 - 3:15
rprice@polisci.umn.edu

COURSE DESCRIPTION

This course focuses on examining why we need to study international law in order to understand world politics. It is not primarily intended to train you how to be a lawyer, though we will engage in exercises in legal reasoning and an international law simulation. The central goal of the course is to familiarize students with a broad range of analytical tools to enable them to think critically about how to understand and explain the origins and impact of international law on the world. How do we explain where particular laws and norms come from? How do they affect the shape of global politics and the outcomes of particular events? Why do states obey international law? A major substantive focus of the course will be on the area where international law has long been thought to be the least effective: the laws of warfare. Other issues examined will include human rights law, the environment, law of the sea, international criminal law, and the role of law in the formation of the international system and the sovereign state.

    The web site for this course provides students with course information, questions and assignments for discussion sections, and resources essential for class assignments. Students should check the web site regularly for updates.

COURSE REQUIREMENTS
    Class will consist of lectures and once-weekly discussion sections. In preparation for discussion sections, students are required to 1) complete the assigned reading for each week; 2) formulate three questions / comments on the readings to share with the class; 3) prepare responses to each week's discussion section questions that will have been made available on the course web page. Students will also be required to write one 7-page paper on one of the discussion section topics.

    Student evaluation is based upon class participation in discussions, a discussion section paper, a mid-term exam, a simulation exercise, and a final exam. Note: Students must provide proper documentation for excused absences (illnesses, deaths of loved ones, etc.) to receive any extensions of deadlines. Make-up exams and incompletes will only be given for documented emergencies.

Participation & Discussion                        - 20%
Discussion Section Topic Paper                - 10%
Mid-term Exam (Friday, October 29)       - 20%
Simulation                                                   - 20%
Final Exam (Saturday, Dec. 18 @ 10:30)  - 30%
 

READING MATERIALS

The following required reading materials are available for purchase in the bookstore. A copy of each will also be placed on reserve in Wilson Library:

• Text: Peter Malanczuk, Akehurst's Modern Introduction to International Law  (7th Edition).
• Reading Packet

• Aryeh Neier, War Crimes (Times Books, 1998).

RESEARCH AND INFORMATION LINKS

In preparing for discussion sections, and for researching your papers and simulation assignments, you will find it useful to use the many international law sources available on the World Wide Web. To help get you started a collection of some of the most useful among these have been gathered together especially for this class into a site called Hugo, after Hugo Grotius, arguably the "father" of international law.