University of St Andrews

Key information

SCOTCAT credits : 30

ECTS credits : 15

Level : SCQF level 10

Semester: 2

Availability restrictions: First preference to be given to MLItt International Political Theory students, but subject to spaces being available, open as a module to other MLitts in the School and other Schools

Planned timetable: To be confirmed

‘Race’ and racism not only shaped the social contours of many western countries, they also underpinned an international order dominated by a few European countries possessed of empires. After World War II anticolonial nationalism remade this imperial international system, replacing empires with numerous sovereign and formally equal nation-states. Drawing upon international history, international relations and postcolonial theory, this course examines 1) the momentous events and processes that remade the world 2) the subsequent emergence of the ‘Third World project’ to fashion a world free of domination of one peoples over others and 3) its subsequent decline and demise. Questions that run through the course include: why did most anticolonial movements culminate in nation-statehood?; was this a strength or a weakness?; did the Third World project fail, and if so, why?; and finally, what lessons might be drawn from this for those who still seek a just and equitable world order?

Learning and teaching methods and delivery

Weekly contact: I seminar (2 hours) x 11 weeks

Scheduled learning hours: 22

Guided independent study hours: 275

Assessment pattern

As used by St Andrews: Coursework = 65%, Examination = 35%

As defined by QAA
Written examinations : 35%
Practical examinations : %
Coursework: 65%

Re-assessment: 100% Written Examination

Personnel

Module coordinator: Professor S Seth
Module teaching staff: Prof Sanjay Seth
Module coordinator email ss544@st-andrews.ac.uk

Intended learning outcomes

• Identify the central determinants in the remaking of the international political order after World War Two
• Compare conventional or mainstream historical accounts of the making of this international order with critical accounts, particularly those according centrality to decolonization in the remaking of ‘the international’
• Identify and assess the importance of notions of ‘race’ to the international system of empires, and to the processes of decolonization that replaced this with a world of nation-states
• Compare and assess differing accounts of ‘imperialism’, and of its importance in the past and in the present