Course Descriptions

This course critically examines the needs of a community in the aftermath of conflict and explores various approaches to peace-building and justice as attempted in northern Uganda. Uganda has struggled, and continues to struggle, with difficult decisions about how to address legacies of violence and human rights violations. For two decades (1986-2006), northern Uganda was the site of fear and violence as the rebel group ‘the Lord’s Resistance Army’ terrorized communities with brutality and kidnapping, creating and maintaining a force of attacking child soldiers. Also accused of atrocity is the government and its army, the UPDF. Uganda came into the spotlight as local and international human rights practitioners debated peace-vs-justice, especially with regards to the imposition of international criminal justice (the first indictments from the International Criminal Court in 2005; first and only conviction happened in March 2021) and the abilities of traditional mechanisms of justice to address mass atrocity and promote reconciliation. There have also been questions about the need or usefulness of a truth and reconciliation commission or possibly the need for vetting in the Ugandan UPDF, (among the options of mechanisms to pursue justice and reconciliation). This study abroad course explores practical questions of transitional justice using Uganda as a case study.

Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST; and permission of the instructor.
Note: Costs in addition to tuition will apply to this course. Please contact the department for details.

This course will examine the politics and social reproduction of work in Canada. It will begin by examining how working people have responded to workplace conditions, beginning in the 19th century and moving to the present day. Here we will examine work broadly, focusing on how both paid and unpaid labour is shaped by class, gender, race and other forms of social inequity. The course will then look at how governments regulate work in the 21st century, examining how employment is structured as a strict legal relationship between those who sell their labour for a wage and those who purchase that labour in order to create additional value through profit. Examining these intersections, the class will then examine the numerous legal structures that shape the modern workplace, focusing on rules of unionization, individual employment relations, and occupational health and safety.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

Introduces students to Canada's constitution, with special emphasis on the judicial system. It will also examine Canada's constitutional debates, with specific emphasis on the judicial role in shaping federal/provincial division of powers since Confederation.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

Introduce students to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Special attention is devoted to the intersection between law and politics, including debates surrounding the introduction of the Charter and those regarding the exercise of judicial power. The course will include extensive case reviews.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.
Note: Students with credit for POLS 307 Topics in Canadian Politics: Law, Politics and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms (offered in 2010-11 and 2011-12) may not take this course for credit.

An examination of the institutions and processes of Canadian provincial political systems with particular emphasis on Saskatchewan.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

An examination of various aspects of local government in Canada, including the evolution of the structures, functions, finances and powers of local government, and the purposes and politics of various contemporary reform issues.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.
Note: This course is typically offered every second year.

An examination of policies and programs impacting Indigenous peoples in Canada, including those developed by Indigenous nations and those established by the federal and provincial governments.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 6 credit units 100-level POLS; or POLS 222.

This course offers students an overview of historical and contemporary Métis, otehpayimusuak and âpihtawikosisânak politics and governance. The use of these three names emphasizes the diversity of distinct, self-determining groups situated in Canada commonly referred to under the single term of ‘Métis.’ The term 'otehpayimusuak' is a Cree-language derived term for 'people who own themselves' and âpihtawikosisânak may be translated as “half-son” or “half-cousin.”

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): POLS 222.3
Note: This course consists of a textbook, with 10 modules and required readings that will be available for students through the WordPress site and via the Canvas course portal. This course is offered online.

States around the world struggle with many of the same policy issues and challenges. As they search for the best policy solutions, they look to other states, epistemic communities and even their own histories for ideas, while recognizing differences in national political cultures and circumstances. This course introduces students to the methods used to compare the public policies of various countries, using case studies of common issues to explore the interplay of political environments, national realities and policy options.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

Political marketing is a sub-field of political science that applies concepts from business marketing literature to the study of politics. It explores the use of marketing techniques by political parties to win elections, governments to ‘sell’ their policies to citizens, and social movements to sway public opinion in their favour and lobby decision-makers. In this course, students will learn the basic concepts of political marketing and apply these concepts to examples from Canada and around the world.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

An introduction to the purposes, approaches, methods, ethics and politics of public policy analysis. It is designed to provide an understanding of how to produce and analyze documents needed for policy-making and decision making purposes in various organizational settings both in the governmental sector and in the non-governmental sector.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.
Note: This course is typically offered every second year.

This course introduces students to the principal theoretical positions used to understand, justify, and evaluate law at both the national and international levels. It asks students to critically engage with classical and critical theories about the nature of law and legal obligations. Questions include: by whom, for whom, and for what purpose should law be created; is law inherently connected to state power? What is the relationship between law and democracy? Is law simply what those with political power make it or is there an inherent connection between law and morality? On a more practical level, can laws and legal systems that are not backed up with enforcement power truly be called law? Examples from the Canadian legal system and international law offer opportunities to test and develop insights about the meaning and proper reach of the law.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

Justice and democracy are two key ideas in contemporary politics. While we generally think they are harmonious ideas, often times they come into conflict. This course addresses contemporary theoretical approaches to the relationship between justice and democracy. Issues to be covered include, what is to be done when democracies reach unjust decisions, what kind of democracy does justice require and how can democratic institutions be designed to produce more just outcomes.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

The course provides an introduction to the government and politics of the nations of East Asia, as well as some of the pressing issues that confront the region. It seeks to provide students with a foundation for a lifelong engagement with a fascinating and increasingly important part of the world.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

This course examines the historical as well as contemporary political, social and cultural processes that have shaped Ukraine’s national identity while exploring their impact on current state-building efforts.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

The world-wide hunger for resources has spurred an explosion in extractive industry development, particularly in mining, oil and gas. This in turn has given rise to wide-spread conflicts between the resource industry and the groups and communities detrimentally affected by it. In many contexts, anti-extractive mobilization is spearheaded by Indigenous groups on whose territories a disproportionately large number of such operations are occurring. Focusing primarily on large scale metal mining, this course will examine the factors giving rise to the global expansion in resource extraction, and the political, social and economic effects of this development on, and the responses of, stakeholders at the local, national and international levels.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST
Note: Students with credit for POLS 398.3 Resource Extraction Resistance and Sustainable Development may not be able to take this course for credit.

As a multinational, ethnoculturally diverse, state Canada must grapple with questions surrounding immigration, integration, and cultural diversity. This course explores the politics of Canadian multiculturalism and immigration policy. It includes discussions of immigration and citizenship rules, recognition of cultural diversity, anti-racism and human rights policy and law, and employment equity. It also explores the relationship between Canada’s cultural diversity and nation-building projects in different regions of Canada such as Quebec.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

This course introduces students to the foundations and theory of Canadian Political Economy, with a particular focus on the historical development, and present-day conditions, of capitalism in Canada. The course also explores issues such as the relationship between the Canadian state and the economy; the intersection of capitalism and colonialism; and the political economy of migration, the resource industry, and/or care work. Lastly, the course emphasizes how socio-economic changes have also engendered new forms of struggle and resistance.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

This course introduces students to the foundations and theory of political economy, analyzing global capitalism through a variety of lenses including Classicism, Neo-Classicism, Marxism, Keynesianism, and Neoliberalism. The course also explores issues such as the intersection of capitalism with gender and racial hierarchies, the international monetary systems and finance, the political economy of resource extraction and climate change, and the interactions between economic systems and a variety of political institutions.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

Examines the goals, strategies and actions of international terrorist groups, the efforts of governments to combat terrorism, and the effect of international terrorism on contemporary international relations. Special attention is given to philosophies of violence and to ethical issues surrounding terrorist and counter-terrorist actions.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

An examination of post-war global politics, through the lens of Foreign Policy Analysis. Major attention is given to the ways that the practice and study of foreign policy are embedded in the broader actors, institutions, and processes of global politics. This framework is then applied to contemporary and indicative case studies to understand how the contemporary international order came to be, the tensions that exist within it, and what it might look like in the future.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

Why is war perceived to be a useful and inescapable political activity? This course examines theories and practices of war and militarism beyond the narrow confines of strategic thought to consider the complex lifeworld of organized violence. It examines how war shapes and is shaped by the states, societies and peoples who wage it, in relation to classical texts as well as technological, ethical, and commercial transformations reconfigured by the “global war on terror.”

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

This course examines various approaches to peace-building in the aftermath of conflict, focusing on the restorative role of political reconciliation.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.

Introduction to Canada's role in the world, studying the factors that continue to shape the country's position on global issues and the processes by which its foreign policy is made.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 12 credit units of POLS and/or IS; or 36 credit units at the university level, including at least 6 credit units of ANTH, ENG, HIST, INDG, IS, POLS, RLST, SOC, or WGST.
Note: Students with credit for POLS 365 may not take this course for credit.

Covers topics in Political Studies, offered by the Washington Center, Washington D.C. Possible courses include Religion and Global Politics, Peaceful Solutions, The Road to the White House, Ethics and the U.S. Congress, How Washington Really Works, U.S. Foreign Policy in the 21st Century, Peaceful Solutions, International Human Rights, The Rationality/ Psychology of Conflict, Violence, and War, Most Dangerous Woman in the World, Intercultural Communications, Public Policies that Reduce Hunger and Poverty, U.S. and China in the 20th and 21st Centuries, Global Policy Issues, Strategic Communication for the Policy Making Process, Press, Politics, and Power, Campaigning for a Cause, Scandalous Washington, Crime, Power, & Punishment, Citizenship in Multicultural Society, Government and Business in the New Economic and Political Reality, Introduction to Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure, International Organizations and Humanitarian Law, Managing the American Intelligence Community, Non-profit Leadership and Management, or other topics approved by the Department of Political Studies.

Prerequisite(s): 60 credit units of university level study including 6 credit units senior POLS
Note: Registration in this course is restricted to students selected for the Washington Center Term Abroad program.

This course offers students the opportunity to intern with an organization for a term. Internship opportunities vary but will give students work experience relevant to their degree. Assignments will allow students to acquire insights into how organizations/units are structured and administered, and how policies are developed and implemented. Students will learn about the importance of effective research in policy development, and be able to better understand the relationship between their studies and potential career routes.

Prerequisite(s): 60 credit units at university level and permission of the department.
Note: The internship involves a commitment of 100 hours over the course of the term. Registration is limited to students selected as interns with specific organizations. Interested students must contactpolitical.studies@usask.ca at least two months prior to the start of the term in which they wish to enroll in the course.

Offered occasionally by visiting faculty and in other special situations to cover, in depth, topics that are not thoroughly covered in regularly offered courses.

Weekly hours: 3 Seminar/Discussion hours
Note: Costs in addition to tuition may apply to certain sections of this course. Please contact the department for information.

Offered occasionally by visiting faculty and in other special situations to cover, in depth, topics that are not thoroughly covered in regularly offered courses.

Weekly hours: 3 Seminar/Discussion hours