The Changing Scale of Politics in an Interdependent World

Dernière mise à jour le 10/07/09

Although everyone agrees that globalization is a major phenomenon to be handled by all the social and political sciences, there the agreement ends; the very definition of globalization, the multiplicity of scales at which it should be considered, its long term history and evolution, the impact it has on a wide range of political and economic issues is the object of vast debate.

Every definition of its universality is immediately countered by an alternative definition; every decision of the right scale is countered by the choice of another scale. Instead of trying to define globalization, Sciences Po’s priority is to use its unique range of specialists covering almost all of the areas of the world, and its wide set of different disciplines, to tackle the many contradictory ways in which different areas of the world evolve both independently and in concert. In addition to a comparative focus on individual regions, we are also interested in the transformation of the international system and the nature of power that underlies it.

Of particular importance will be the search for a successor to the definition of the “West”. Projects submitted in this area could include a focus on world history; propose comparative socio-historical perspectives on different regions in the world; examine the evolution and results of economic and political interconnectedness; concentrate on the transformation of law and political authority; study the shifting relationships between countries or the status of specific groups, such as the so-called “emerging economies”; analyze trans-border flows and migrations; or the reshaping of boundaries more generally.