The concentration in International and Public Affairs equips students with the knowledge and skills necessary to be engaged global citizens. This concentration offers three tracks: Development, Policy & Governance, and Security. All students take a common core of five classes, beginning with a choice of thematic gateway lecture courses (ideally taken during freshman or sophomore year), and then building through a required junior seminar and a required senior seminar (eligible students may choose to write an honor's thesis to satisfy the senior seminar requirement). All students choose one of three tracks of substantive specialization: Development, in which students explore issues of human development in local and global contexts, and across both the developing world and advanced industrial settings; Security, which allows students to explore issues of security in both local and global contexts; and Policy and Governance, in which students explore the design, implementation, and evaluation of public policies to resolve societal challenges, as well as the governing structures that yield those policies. The concentration is committed to engaging students in the classroom, enabling research opportunities with faculty and in the field, and supporting experiential learning opportunities. Advisors' office hours and an online appointment scheduler are available here.
Concentration Requirements
The concentration comprises 11 courses (12 for an honors degree). Students take a Gateway course, which introduces them to multidisciplinary perspectives on social challenges that cut across global regions. The Foundational course introduces students to central themes and texts in the three IAPA tracks: Development, Policy and Governance, and Security. Gateway and Track Foundational courses are not interchangeable or substitutable with courses offered in other concentrations. They should both be taken in the first or second year.
Once a student has chosen a track, they take five electives, selected from a pre-approved list for each track on our website. Approval of track elective courses not on the pre-approved list is permitted only in extenuating circumstances. Note that that list of electives is subject to change. We encourage students to cluster two or three of these electives around a region, theme, or social problem to create coherence in their plan of study and prepare for future work.
Students also take courses in qualitative and quantitative methods (a high-level course in language instruction can substitute for one of the two methods courses).
All International and Public Affairs concentrators take a junior seminar (1700 level) during the fall or spring semester of the junior year. The seminars, which are not track specific, focus on issues in international and public affairs that can be studied in comparative perspective, that can be subjected to multidisciplinary analysis, and that often cut across concerns about development, policy and governance, and security. The seminars are designed to help students hone skills of critical thinking, argumentation, and the design and operation of social science research and scholarship. Junior seminar students write papers on topics that can later be pursued as capstone or thesis projects. Junior seminars are not interchangeable or substitutable with courses in other concentrations. Junior seminars are typically WRIT-designated.
All International and Public Affairs concentrators complete a capstone course during their senior year. Designated IAPA Senior Seminars (1800 level) require students to write a research paper or extended policy brief that draws on analytic expertise, thematic expertise, regional expertise, and foreign language skills, if applicable. The capstone research project is typically about 20-25 pages in length. Senior capstone seminars are not interchangeable or substitutable with courses offered in other concentrations. Senior seminars are typically WRIT-designated. Eligible seniors may choose to write a two-semester honors thesis to satisfy the senior capstone requirement.
Track Specialization and Electives
IAPA students must take the track foundational course associated with their track specialization (Development, Security, or Policy & Governance). Track foundational courses are not interchangeable or substitutable with courses offered in other concentrations. Students select 5 elective courses from the list of pre-approved electives consistent with their track specialization. Approval of track elective courses not on the pre-approved list is permitted only in extenuating circumstances. Note - the list of electives is subject to change.
| Gateway Course | 1 | |
IAPA 0210 | Life and Politics on the US-Mexico Border | |
| Costs of War | ||
| Fiscal Plumbing 101: The American Tax State in Comparative and Historical Perspective | ||
| How We Compete: The Race for Industrial Supremacy Over Time and Place | ||
| Using Big Data to Solve Economic and Social Problems | ||
| Politics of the Illicit Global Economy | ||
| Power, Knowledge and Justice in Global Social Change | ||
| Track Foundational | 1 | |
| Foundations of Development | ||
| Foundations of Policy and Governance | ||
| Foundations of Security | ||
| Track Electives (See tables below) | 5 | |
| Qualitative Research Methods 1 | 1 | |
| Ethnographic Research Methods | ||
| Methods of Social Research | ||
| Quantitative Research Methods 2 | 1 | |
| Introduction to Econometrics | ||
| What Works: Evaluating the Impact of Social Programs | ||
| Political Research Methods | ||
| Introductory Statistics for Social Research | ||
| Junior Seminar 3 | ||
| Displaced: How Global Systems Shape Refugee Families | ||
| Inequality, Policy, and Economics | ||
| Survey of Time: Temporality, Social Theory, and Difference | ||
| Justice, Gender, and Markets | ||
| Diplomacy, an Art That Isn't Lost | ||
| Democratization | ||
| The Cold War in Latin America | ||
| American Education Policy in Historical and Comparative Perspective | ||
| Climate Change, Power, & Money | ||
| Animals and War | ||
| Beyond Refugeehood: Politics of mobility, border regimes, and humanitarianism | ||
| The Politics of Industrial Transformation | ||
| Governance from Socialist to Post-socialist China | ||
| Senior Capstone 4 | ||
| Law and Public Policy | ||
| Politics & Journalism: A Practical Guide to How We Got Here and Where We’re Going | ||
| Prison Abolition as Policy | ||
| Rwanda Past and Present | ||
| Humanitarian Response in Modern Conflict | ||
| Diplomacy, Crisis, and War in the Modern Era | ||
| Iran and the Islamic Revolution | ||
| Legal Methods for Public Policy | ||
| Overcoming Threats to Human Security | ||
| Democratization and Autocratization | ||
| Contemporary Digital Policy and Politics | ||
| Political Psychology of International Relations | ||
| IAPA 1816A | Senior Honors Seminar | 1 |
| IAPA 1817A | Senior Honors Thesis | 1 |
| Total Credits | 11 | |
- 1
A comparable course from an outside department (including ANTH 1236, ANTH 1940, BIOL 1575, EDUC 1240, SOC 1117, SOC 1260, SOC 1340) may also be used.
- 2
A comparable course from an outside department including (APMA 1650, CLPS 0900, CSCI 0300, CSCI 0111, ECON 1620, EDUC 1230) may also be used.
- 3
Other 1700-level approved IAPA courses may also fulfill the Junior Seminar requirement
- 4
Other 1800-level approved IAPA courses may also fulfill the Senior Seminar requirement. Students pursuing honors are required to take the IAPA Honors Seminar (IAPA 1816A or IAPA 1850) in the fall and a directed reading independent study with their primary thesis reader in the spring.
Examples of track electives include the following: (Note that a full list is available on the IAPA website.)
| DEVELOPMENT TRACK | ||
| Five courses from the following (approval of track elective courses not on the pre-approved list is permitted only in extenuating circumstances): | 5 | |
| Middle East in Anthropological Perspective | ||
| Anthropology of Homelessness | ||
| Current Global Macroeconomic Challenges | ||
| Economic Growth | ||
| Farm Planet: Hunger, Development, and the Future of Food and Agriculture | ||
| The Global British Empire, 1600-The Present | ||
| Economic Development in Latin America | ||
| Beyond Sun, Sea and Sand: Exploring the Contemporary Caribbean | ||
| History of the State of Israel: 1948 to the Present | ||
| Public Health in a Changing World: Law, Policy & Justice | ||
| The Rise of China | ||
| Security, Governance and Development in Africa | ||
| Race, Class, and Ethnicity in the Modern World | ||
| Urban Asia: Beyond Tradition, Modernity, and Crisis | ||
| Total Credits | 5 | |
Development Professional Track
IAPA does not give course credit for internships, but we officially recognize their importance via the optional Professional Track. The requirements for the professional track include all those of the standard tracks, as well as the following:
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Students must complete full-time professional experiences doing work related to their concentration program totaling 2-6 months. Each internship must be at least one month in duration in cases where students choose to do more than one internship experience. Such work is normally done at a company, but may also be at a university under the supervision of a faculty member.
-
On completion of each professional experience or internship, the student must write and upload to ASK a reflective essay about the experience addressing the following prompts, to be approved by the student's concentration advisor:
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Which courses were put to use in your summer's work? Which topics, in particular, were important?
-
In retrospect, which courses should you have taken before your summer experience or internship? Which topics from these courses would have helped you over the summer if you had been more familiar with them?
-
Are there topics you should have been familiar with in preparation for your summer experience or internship, but are not taught at Brown? What are these topics?
-
What did you learn from the experience that probably could not have been picked up from coursework?
-
Is the sort of work you did over the summer something you would like to continue doing once you graduate? Explain.
-
Would you recommend your summer experience to other Brown students? Explain.
| SECURITY TRACK ELECTIVES | ||
| Five courses from the following (approval of track elective courses not on the pre-approved list is permitted only in extenuating circumstances): | 5 | |
| Cybersecurity and International Relations | ||
| Economics of Global Warming | ||
| Humanitarianism and Conflict in Africa | ||
| Victory, Defeat, and Everything In-Between: History, Strategy, and Politics | ||
| History of American Intervention | ||
| Nuclear Weapons | ||
| The International Law and Politics of Human Rights | ||
| Geopolitics of Oil and Energy | ||
| Migrants, Refugees and the Mediterranean | ||
| The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: Contested Narratives | ||
| Total Credits | 5 | |
Security Professional Track
IAPA does not give course credit for internships, but we officially recognize their importance via the optional Professional Track. The requirements for the professional track include all those of the standard tracks, as well as the following:
-
Students must complete full-time professional experiences doing work related to their concentration program totaling 2-6 months. Each internship must be at least one month in duration in cases where students choose to do more than one internship experience. Such work is normally done at a company, but may also be at a university under the supervision of a faculty member.
-
On completion of each professional experience or internship, the student must write and upload to ASK a reflective essay about the experience addressing the following prompts, to be approved by the student's concentration advisor:
-
Which courses were put to use in your summer's work? Which topics, in particular, were important?
-
In retrospect, which courses should you have taken before your summer experience or internship? Which topics from these courses would have helped you over the summer if you had been more familiar with them?
-
Are there topics you should have been familiar with in preparation for your summer experience or internship, but are not taught at Brown? What are these topics?
-
What did you learn from the experience that probably could not have been picked up from coursework?
-
Is the sort of work you did over the summer something you would like to continue doing once you graduate? Explain.
-
Would you recommend your summer experience to other Brown students? Explain.
| POLICY & GOVERNANCE TRACK ELECTIVES | ||
| Five courses from the following (approval of track elective courses not on the pre-approved list is permitted only in extenuating circumstances): | 5 | |
| African American Women's History | ||
| Anthropology of Addictions and Recovery | ||
| Information Retrieval and Web Search | ||
| Intergenerational Poverty in America | ||
| The Economics of Latin Americans | ||
| Victory, Defeat, and Everything In-Between: History, Strategy, and Politics | ||
| Sustainable Design in the Built Environment | ||
| The Modern Chinese Nation: An Idea and Its Limits | ||
| Movement Politics in Modern America | ||
| COVID-19, Public Health, and Health Policy | ||
| Reproductive Health, Rights and Justice | ||
| Polarized Politics | ||
| Politics, Economy and Society in India | ||
| Criminal Courts and the Law in an Era of Mass Incarceration | ||
| The Political Foundations of the City | ||
| Total Credits | 5 | |
Policy & Governance Professional Track
IAPA does not give course credit for internships, but we officially recognize their importance via the optional Professional Track. The requirements for the professional track include all those of the standard tracks, as well as the following:
-
Students must complete full-time professional experiences doing work related to their concentration program totaling 2-6 months. Each internship must be at least one month in duration in cases where students choose to do more than one internship experience. Such work is normally done at a company, but may also be at a university under the supervision of a faculty member.
-
On completion of each professional experience or internship, the student must write and upload to ASK a reflective essay about the experience addressing the following prompts, to be approved by the student's concentration advisor:
-
Which courses were put to use in your summer's work? Which topics, in particular, were important?
-
In retrospect, which courses should you have taken before your summer experience or internship? Which topics from these courses would have helped you over the summer if you had been more familiar with them?
-
Are there topics you should have been familiar with in preparation for your summer experience or internship, but are not taught at Brown? What are these topics?
-
What did you learn from the experience that probably could not have been picked up from coursework?
-
Is the sort of work you did over the summer something you would like to continue doing once you graduate? Explain.
-
Would you recommend your summer experience to other Brown students? Explain.
Honors
Students who demonstrate exceptional academic performance and scholarly achievement in the International and Public Affairs concentration have the opportunity to be recommended for graduation with honors. Students submit applications to the Honors Program in the spring semester of their junior year. Students who are graduating in December can apply for the honors program in the spring semester (their 5th) to complete their thesis in the 7th semester with the spring cohort.
To apply, students must meet IAPA honors course and GPA prerequisites and turn in a well-developed social science research question, method, and bibliography along with a plan for completing the thesis by April of senior year. They must also have secured signatures of a primary thesis advisor and a second reader. Only those students with an approved thesis application will be permitted to enter the senior thesis seminar in the fall and /or receive thesis grant funding for the summer.