B4807 - Global Visions and Political Networks (1) (LM)

Learning outcomes

At the end of the course unit students will have acquired an understanding of the concept of entangled history centered around global political networks. Students will also have familiarity with the ways in which global visions have emerged in the twentieth century, and with their critiques. Students will have gained knowledge of the ways that influential ideas and ideologies have shaped historical events and processes on global scale. Students will have identified the relevance of different traditions of global thinking including internationalist, liberal, anti-imperialist and federal approaches. On successful completion of this module, students will be expected to have constructed a solid theoretical framework within which specific research interests could be developed.

Course contents

This course aims to analyze different aspects of global political networks in the context of entangled history. This year, the main focus of the course is the relations between international visions, empire and the environment. The course will discuss the ideas of main political thinkers, recent literature on the topic, and key concepts related to the interplay of the natural and political spheres on a global scale.

In each session, students will be required to read and discuss one article or book chapter. Students may be required to do brief presentations of the readings in class or in small groups. All attending students are requested to prepare the required readings carefully, in order to be able to participate in class discussions. All the readings are uploaded in 'Virtuale' or available at the library.

The course is framed around themes in global and imperial history. Opening with a discussion of imperialism and capitalism and their impact on the environment, the course will then discuss various specific topics in the interplay between humanity and the natural world, including oil, carbon, the sea, rivers and plants. The second part of the course opens with a discussion of anthropology as the sciences of the human species, following up with discussions on migration, colonization, race, indigeneity and legal contestation. Specific issues such as the problem of imperial expansion and resource extraction, ideas of environmental international governance and the notion of ‘crisis’ will be discussed in relation to various readings.

1. Mon 2 Nov
   Empire

   Sunil Amrith. The burning earth: An environmental history of the last 500 years. (2024), introduction.

2. Mon 9 Nov

   The Market
   Pierre Charbonnier, Affluence and Freedom: an environmental history of political ideas (Polity, 2021), chapter 7.

3. Wed 11 nov
   Fossil fuel
   Andreas Malm, Fossil Capital: The Rise of Steam Power and the Roots of Global Warming (Verso, 2016), introduction.
   
   
4. Thur 12 Nov
   Oil
   Timothy Mitchell, Carbon Democracy: Political Power in the Age of Oil (Verso, 2011), introduction
   
   
5. Mon 16 Nov
   The Sea

   Surabhi Ranganathan, The Seabed and the South: From Stock Stories to New Histories of International Lawmaking. Journal of Human Rights and the Environment, (2024),

6. Wed 18 Nov
   Rivers
   Yao, Joanne. The Ideal River: How Control of Nature Shaped the International Order. 2022, introduction.
   
   
7. Thur 19 Nov
   International expertise (guest lecture) 
   
   
8. Mon 23 Nov
   Plants
   Rachel Carson, Silent Spring (Houghton Mifflin, 1962)
   
   
9. Wed 25 Nov
   Guest lecture: Dr Valentina Mann, the history of Anthropology
   
   
10. Thur 26 Nov
    The Anthropocene

    Christophe Bonneuil and Jean-Baptiste Fressoz,. The Shock of the Anthropocene: The Earth, History and Us. (Verso, 2016), introduction.

11. Mon 30 Nov

    Planetary community
    Dipesh Chakrabarty, The Planet: An Emergent Humanist Category (2019). https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/705298

12. Wed 2 Dec
    Settler colonialism and climate

    Kennedy, D. (2017). "The perils of the midday sun: Climatic anxieties in the colonial tropics". In Imperialism and the natural world. Manchester, England: Manchester University Press.

    
    
13. Thur 3 Dec

    Race and anticolonialism

    Frank Gerits, The Anticolonial Scramble for Africa, 2024. chapter 7.

14. Wed 9 Dec
    Nature and the body
    Tehila Sasson, Milking the Third World? Humanitarianism, Capitalism, and the Moral Economy of the Nestlé Boycott, AHR, 2016.
    
    
15. Thur 10 Dec
    Contestations
    Philippe Sands, The Last Colony: A Tale of Exile, Justice and Britain’s Colonial Legacy (W&N, 2022)

Readings/Bibliography

Students may use this suggested bibliography to enrich their knowledge on the course themes, in addition to the indicated readings for each session.

Armitage, David. Foundations of Modern International Thought. Cambridge ;New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013.

———. ‘The Fifty Years Rift: Intellectual History and International Relations’. Modern Intellectual History 1, no. 1 (April 2004): 97–109. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1479244303000027.

Bartelson, Jens. Visions of World Community. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009.

Bell, Duncan, ed. Political Thought and International Relations: Variations on a Realist Theme. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

———. The Idea of Greater Britain: Empire and the Future of World Order, 1860-1900. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2007.

Boer, Pim den, Peter Bugge, and Ole Wæver. The History of the Idea of Europe. Edited by Kevin Wilson and W. J. van der Dussen. London: Routledge, 1995.

Bosco, Andrea, ed. The Federal Idea. Vol. 1, The History of Federalism from the Enlightenment to 1945. London: Lothian Foundation Press, 1991.

———, ed. The Federal Idea Vol. 2, The History of Federalism since 1945. London: Lothian Foundation Press, 1992.

Campbell, Courtney J. ‘Space, Place and Scale: Human Geography and Spatial History in Past and Present’. Past & Present. Accessed 2 May 2017. https://doi.org/10.1093/pastj/gtw006.

Eggers, N., Pearson, J. L., & Almada e Santos, A. (2020). The United Nations and Decolonization. United Kingdom: Routledge

Hotta, Eri. Pan-Asianism and Japan’s War 1931-1945. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007.

Long, David. Towards a New Liberal Internationalism: The International Theory of J.A. Hobson. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996.

Macekura Stephen J. and Erez Manela eds. The Development Century: A Global History, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018)

Manela, Erez, The Wilsonian Moment: Self-Determination and the International Origins of Anticolonial Nationalism (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2007).

Mazower, Mark. Governing the World: The History of an Idea. London: Allen Lane, 2012.

Pedersen, Susan, The Guardians: The League of Nations and the Crisis of Empire. New York: Oxford University. Press, 2015.

Porter, Bernard. The Absent-Minded Imperialists: Empire, Society, and Culture in Britain. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.

Owens, P. (2022). Women's international thought : towards a new canon. Cambridge University Press.

Owens, P., & Rietzler, K. (2021). Women's international thought. A new history. Cambridge University Press.

Sluga, Glenda, Internationalism in the Age of Nationalism, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013.

Sluga, Glenda and Patricia Clavin, Internationalisms: A Twentieth Century History, Cambridge Cambridge Univerity Press.

Teaching methods

Frontal lectures, slides, students' presentations, class discussion, analysis of sources.

Assessment methods

Assessment methods

Students who attend at least 75% of the lessons are considered to be attending

Attending students will be evaluated through the final examination (100%).

The final exam (12 credits) is a paper on a topic of the student’s choice. The student can choose to write the paper with Prof Rosenboim or Prof Bonazza, according to their topic of interest and to the professors’ availability. The topic of the paper and the research question must be agreed in advance with the professor. The length of the paper will be up to 6500 words including notes and excluding bibliography. The paper must critically engage with the existing historiography on the chosen topic. The paper must be based on at least 6 academic secondary sources, which may include but not limited to the course’s bibliography. Proper use of the English language, adequate presentation and academic style will be part of the evaluation. The paper must have proper references in footnotes and a bibliography. For the references, Chicago Style is preferred but not mandatory.

The final exam (6 credits) is a paper on a topic of the student’s choice. The student can choose to write the paper with Prof Rosenboim, according to their topic of interest and to the professor's availability. The topic of the paper and the research question must be agreed in advance with the professor. The length of the paper will be up to 3250 words including notes and excluding bibliography. The paper must critically engage with the existing historiography on the chosen topic. The paper must be based on at least 6 academic secondary sources, which may include but not limited to the course’s bibliography. Proper use of the English language, adequate presentation and academic style will be part of the evaluation. The paper must have proper references in footnotes and a bibliography. For the references, Chicago Style is preferred but not mandatory.

Non-attending students (12 credits) are required to write the final paper (following the same guidelines as the attending students) and in addition to do a written exam. The written exam is based on 2 books, and includes 6 questions (3 for each book). The exam lasts 1.5 hours and will be taken in person at the computer lab.

During the academic year 2026/2027 there will be 6 available dates to undertake the exam. The dates will be published on the webpage of Prof. Rosenboim and Prof. Bonazza (each professor holds 3 exam dates). *You can choose freelyamong all exam dates.

The required readings for the written exam for non-attending students are:

Pierre Charbonnier, Affluence and Freedom: an environmental history of political ideas (Polity, 2021),

M’hamed Oualdi, A Slave between Empires. A Transimperial History of North Africa (New York: Columbia University Press, 2020)

Please note: The module is part of the integrated course Entangled Histories (12 credits). Students who attend this module, but did not attend Prof Bonazza's module, will have to sit a short written exam (25% of the final mark) in addition to the final paper to qualify for 12 credits.
The exam includes 3 questions, based on this book:

M’hamed Oualdi, A Slave between Empires. A Transimperial History of North Africa (New York: Columbia University Press, 2020)

 

AI policy: Artificial intelligence (AI) can be a useful tool to support individual study through in-depth materials, summaries, and self-assessment activities. With regard to the assessment of learning, a limited, declared, and non-substantive use of AI is permitted for support activities (summaries and reformulations). Substantive use of AI to complete parts of the assessment is not permitted.

Exam sessions for the written exam and for the final paper (separately) are scheduled for the following months of the academic year:

- December 2026

- January 2027

- March 2027

- May 2027

- July 2027

- September 2027

Marking criteria:

Proper language and the ability to critically analyze relevant topics will lead to a good/excellent final grade (27-30L)

Acceptable language and the ability to resume relevant topics will lead to a sufficient/fair grade (22-26)

poor language and a superficial knowledge of relevant topics will lead to the minimum grade to pass the exam (18-21)

Insufficient linguistic proficiency and fragmentary knowledge of relevant topics will lead to a failure in passing the exam

Teaching tools

database research, virtuale, seminars.

Students with disabilities and Specific Learning Disorders (SLD)

Students who require specific services and adaptations to teaching activities due to a disability or specific learning disorders (SLD), must first contact the appropriate office:

[https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en/for-students]

Office hours

See the website of Or Rosenboim