Undergraduate Module Descriptor

POC3117: The Politics of Climate Change

This module descriptor refers to the 2021/2 academic year.

Please note that this module is only delivered on the Penryn Campus.

Module Aims

This module aims to help you examine why the issue of climate change is so difficult to address. While being rooted in concepts from political science, it aims to provide you with a platform through which the climate change problematique can be analysed from different disciplinary and theoretical perspectives. Through a mixture of activities your learning will be organised around key aspects of climate change governance, namely: politicisation of science, the political economy of climate change, fairness in international negotiations’ and evaluating climate policy.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)
This module's assessment will evaluate your achievement of the ILOs listed here – you will see reference to these ILO numbers in the details of the assessment for this module.
On successfully completing the programme you will be able to:
Module-Specific Skills	1. evidence a significant depth of understanding about the role and perspectives of different actors involved in climate policy; 2. demonstrate an excellent level of knowledge about the complexities of addressing climate change across different policy sectors and governance scales; 3. evaluate critically policy initiatives to tackle climate change; 4. identify examples of climate policy good practice, and produce a critical evaluation of the lessons that can be drawn; 5. recognise and offer detailed explanations about the difficulties in reaching a meaningful global agreement on climate change.
Discipline-Specific Skills	6. think critically, analyse debates and present coherent arguments on politics; 7. evaluate critically the effectiveness of policy; 8. understand and explain in-depth the reasons for and barriers to policy intervention; 9. critically apply theories of political science and international relations to real-life political situations.
Personal and Key Skills	10. effectively communicate complex topics in a coherent and well-structured manner.

Module Content

Syllabus Plan

Whilst the module’s precise content may vary, it is envisaged that the syllabus will cover some or all of the following topics:

The politicisation of climate science
The political economy of climate change
Climate policy evaluation
Communicating climate change
International climate policy

Learning and Teaching

This table provides an overview of how your hours of study for this module are allocated:

Scheduled Learning and Teaching Activities	Guided independent study	Placement / study abroad
22	128	0

...and this table provides a more detailed breakdown of the hours allocated to various study activities:

Category	Hours of study time	Description
Scheduled Learning and Teaching Activity	22	11 x 2 hour seminars
Guided Independent Study	78	Reading and seminar preparation
Guided Independent Study	50	Course work preparation and writing

Online Resources

This module has online resources available via ELE (the Exeter Learning Environment).