Module Information

This module contributes to the Department's provision in the area of International Relations Theory and International History. It provides students with the opportunity to explore the evolution of Realist thought during the twentieth century and familiarize themselves with contemporary Realist approaches to post-Cold War international politics.

This module aims to provide students with a historical overview of the development of Realist thought since the late nineteenth century. We will study the leading Realist works in their historical context, with the aim of demonstrating how Realist thought responded to, as well as sought to analyse, war and peace in the modern period. The course will cover the advent of modern international relations thought before the Second World War, the rise of structural realism in the 1950s, and Realist responses to and elaborations of structural realism over the past half-century.