Political Science 499CC - HN-EnergyPoliticsClimateChange

This year-long course offers a multidisciplinary approach to better understand human energy extraction and consumption, a key contributor to climate change. How do human extraction and use of fossil fuels contribute to climate change, and who has benefited and suffered as a result of increased fossil fuel use over the last century? What are the political economic forces - including the power of multinational corporations, politics of public policies, and popular apathy and protest - that perpetuate status quo systems of fossil fuel production and use? What renewable energy possibilities exist and what are the unintended effects of their implementation? In answering these questions, the course adopts a political economic lens, focusing on power, inequality and spatial dimensions of energy, illuminating the ways in which marginalized populations such as rural citizens, laborers, and ecosystems have often suffered as a result of energy extraction and production, while corporations and some citizens have benefited from increased profits and consumption of energy. Students will learn to identify and dissect the methodological approach the authors of scholarly works use in their research and receive guidance in the process of asking research questions and designing studies. Particular attention will be given to the following methods, although students may use quantitative methods if they have appropriate training prior to the class: single case studies; paired comparisons; historical analysis based on newspaper and other archival sources; and participant observation. This course may be of interest to majors in political science, sociology, anthropology, history, geography, BDIC, and Eco, among others. (499-seminar)

This course is open to Senior & Junior Commonwealth Honors College students only.