Dr David Rampton

This course is available on the MSc in Conflict Studies, MSc in Global Politics, MSc in International Affairs (LSE and Peking University), MSc in International Relations, MSc in International Relations (LSE and Sciences Po), MSc in International Relations (Research), MSc in International Relations Theory, MSc in Theory and History of International Relations and MSc in Women, Peace and Security. This course is available with permission as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit.

All students are required to obtain permission from the Teacher Responsible by completing the Student Statement box on the online application form linked to course selection on LSE for You. Admission is not guaranteed.

A basic background knowledge of the subject would be an advantage.

This course is intended for those interested in theoretical and practical approaches to the question of peace, the problems of war, conflict and violence, and responses to them particularly in the form of liberal peacebuilding  and statebuilding. The course is divided into three unequal but interconnected parts. The first part examines ideas and debates about the concepts, causes, contexts, dynamics and representations of conflict, violence and war. The second explores and problematises the concept of peace and the nature, meanings and goals of peace and peacebuilding. This leads into the third section which is concerned with a critical engagement with the range of international responses to conflict associated with the discourses and practices of liberal peacebuilding and statebuilding. The seminars explore the nexus between theory and practice. Although the course and its readings are mainly theoretical and conceptual rather than empirical, students are encouraged to apply the ideas to actual cases, past and present.

9 hours of lectures and 13 hours and 30 minutes of seminars in the MT. 9 hours of lectures and 13 hours and 30 minutes of seminars in the LT.

Students on this course will have a reading week in Week 6, in line with departmental policy.The course also features weekly film showings linked to the lecture theme.

Students will be expected to produce 1 essay in the MT and 1 piece of coursework in the LT.

The MT formative essay up to 2,000 words. The LT essay outline up to 1,500 words.

Mark Duffield Global Governance and the New Wars (Zed Books 2014).

Sinisa Malesevic The Sociology of War and Violence (Cambridge University Press 2010).

Oliver Richmond (ed.) Palgrave Advances in Peacebuilding: Critical Developments and Approaches (Palgrave MacMillan UK 2010).

Hugh Miall, Oliver Ramsbotham, and Tom Woodhouse, Contemporary Conflict Resolution: The Prevention, Management and Transformation of Deadly Conflicts, 3rd ed (Polity, 2011).

Roland Paris and Timothy Sisk (eds.), The Dilemmas of Statebuilding (Routledge 2008).

Essay (35%, 2500 words) in the LT.
Essay (55%, 4000 words) in the ST.
Class participation (10%) in the MT and LT.