Undergraduate Course: The Political Psychology of World Leaders (PLIT10141)
Course Outline
School | School of Social and Political Science |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 10 (Year 3 Undergraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
Summary | This course examines the impact individual leaders can have on international relations and politics, focusing on how psychological characteristics of political leaders influence political processes and outcomes, particularly in foreign policy. |
Course description |
This course examines the impact individual leaders can have on international relations. It focuses on how psychological characteristics of political leaders influence political processes and outcomes, particularly in foreign policy. Students learn the research-based arguments about the importance of leaders in international relations and the ways in which leaders' experiences, beliefs, and personalities affect their conduct of foreign policy and other behaviours important in international politics (such as international organisational leadership and multilateral negotiations). This course covers non-psychological approaches, non-personality psychological approaches, and several personality approaches, especially Operational Code Analysis and Leadership Trait Analysis., A theme of the course is how leaders' psychological traits interact with political contexts. While the focus is on theories, concepts and methods used to study world leaders generally, the course includes specific examples of leaders from around the world. This course runs as a seminar, with no traditional lecture time. Students conduct their own political personality profiles of leaders as part of the course assessment requirements.
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Information for Visiting Students
Pre-requisites | Visiting students should have at least 4 Politics/International Relations courses at grade B or above (or be predicted to obtain this). We will only consider University/College level courses.
** as numbers are limited, visiting students should contact the Visiting Student Section for admission to this course ** |
High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
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Academic year 2021/22, Available to all students (SV1)
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Quota: 0 |
Course Start |
Semester 1 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
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Seminar/Tutorial Hours 22,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
174 )
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Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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Additional Information (Assessment) |
Article Evaluation Paper (2000 word max) 35%
Personality Profile (3500 word max) 65% |
Feedback |
Students receive formative feedback and marks on the article evaluation exercise prior to the deadline for the profile, final assessment.
In addition, the course structure, with its focus on readings and theories and methods of profile gives formative feedback (in terms of my reactions to students' questions about the readings and in the 'lab' week) throughout the course, which helps them develop knowledge and skills for the article evaluation assessment and the final profile.
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No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Demonstrate knowledge of and critically evaluate ways to explain, classify, and study political leadership in international relations.
- Evaluate political leadership across different forms and contexts in the international system.
- Recognise, clearly explain, and assess the central arguments, debates, and research questions from scholarly research on the political psychology of leadership.
- Carry out an applied research project which employs established theories and methods for assessing world leaders.
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Reading List
Badie, D (2010). Groupthink, Iraq, and the War on Terror: Explaining US policy shift toward Iraq," Foreign Policy Analysis 6(4).
Cuhadar, E, Kaarbo, J, Kesgin, B, & Ozkececi-Taner, B (2017). Personality or Role? Comparisons of Turkish Leaders Across Different Institutional Positions. Political Psychology 38(1).
Dyson, SB and MJ Parent (2018) 'The Operational Code Approach to Profiling Foreign Political Leaders: Understanding Vladimir Putin,' Intelligence and National Security 33(1).
Jentleson, B (2018) The Peacemakers: Leadership Lessons From Twentieth-Century Statesmanship.
Post, JM (2014). "Personality profiling analysis. In Rhodes. & t'Hart, (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Political Leadership. |
Additional Information
Graduate Attributes and Skills |
By the end of the course students should have strengthened their skills in:
- cognitive skills of evaluation and critical analysis (through course discussion and assessments);
- written and verbal communication skills (through course discussions and assessments, numeracy (with some readings and course discussion and some options in final assessment involving statistical analyses) and IT skills (by learning a computer programme, ProfilerPlus); and
- working effectively as an autonomous researcher (in their assessments). |
Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
Course organiser | Prof Juliet Kaarbo
Tel: (0131 6)50 4252
Email: J.Kaarbo@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Miss Veronica Silvestre
Tel: (0131 6)51 337
Email: Veronica.Silvestre@ed.ac.uk |
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