Teaching

BA Seminar, Summer Term 2026 (in preparation)

Experts in Security Policymaking

Andreas Kruck

This seminar studies the role of experts in the making of security. Not only in national political systems but also at the inter- and transnational level, commercial as well as non-profit experts such as specialized public agencies, scientists and thinktanks, private security firms or big tech companies shape the making and implementation of security policies. At the same time, experts and their authority are often contested and part of political power struggles. What makes experts powerful in the making of security policies? Through what mechanisms do experts shape the processes and outputs of security policymaking? Does expertise-based governance enhance the effectiveness of security policymaking? How legitimate is expertise-based security policymaking? We will address these (and other) questions from a broad range of explanatory and critical theories. We will look at various types of public and, in particular, non-state experts at various – national, inter- and transnational – levels. In their presentations, participants to this class will conduct theoretically informed and methodologically sound case studies.

For further request: andreas.kruck{at}gsi.uni-muenchen.de

BA Seminar, Winter Term 2025/26

Basic Course International Relations

Yagnya Kodaru; Lorenz Sommer

Together with the lecture ‚Internationale Beziehungen I’ the basic course introduces students to the discipline of International Relations (IR). In the first part the course we will discuss the key theories of IR ranging from realism, institutionalism, liberalism, constructivism to more postpositivist theories of international politics. The second part will apply these theories to concrete empirical events and policy areas such as security, economics, the environment and human rights. By the end of the course students should be able to apply IR theories to explain international political phenomena.

For further request: Lorenz.Sommer{at}lmu.de

BA Seminar, Winter Term 2025/26

Cybersecurity

Moritz Weiss

This seminar introduces BA students into a better understanding of how the digital revolution has transformed the provision of security. We address the key challenge for political actors to establish cybersecurity across different domains (e.g. markets, critical infrastructures, inter-state relations). For example, new risks are emerging, but their imputability always remains disputed. This increases the general uncertainty in international relations. In this way, the establishment of cybersecurity gradually changes political processes of different actors in the 21st century. On the one hand, the state builds up new capacities (e.g. in ministries of the interior and defence) and, on the other hand, enacts new regulations that systematically change economic exchange in the market. In addition, international and transnational organisations in particular also play a central role in rule-making. Against this background, numerous questions arise about continuity and change in security policy, but also about similarities and differences in the production of cybersecurity.

For further request: moritz.weiss{at}gsi.uni-muenchen.de

MA Seminar, Summer Term 2025

European Security

Moritz Weiss

Students should learn (i) problem-driven, (ii) theory-led, (iii) empirical research in this seminar on the European Union’s (EU) foreign and security policy. While questions of peace and war have been constitutive for the emergence of the EU as a political project, its integration of foreign and security policy as a core state power has only been initiated by the Treaty of Maastricht in the 1990s. Ever since, EU foreign and security policy is torn between overstretched expectations to resolve global problems and its actual performance in world politics. Tensions between integration and fragmentation, between being an object but also a subject of power struggles, and between continuity and change will serve as a guide throughout this course. We will address the EU’s multi-level enterprise with an explicit view on the polity, the policy, and the politics: What kind of actor is emerging? What explains the nascent integration of EU foreign and security policy? What explains the EU’s policies (e.g. crisis management)?

For further request: moritz.weiss{at}gsi.uni-muenchen.de

MA Seminar, Winter Term 2022/23

Researching the Regulatory Security State

Andreas Kruck and Moritz Weiss

This seminar, which was conceived as a “research-oriented learning” course, studied the changing role and shape of the state in the provision of European and global security. The participants investigated to what extent, why, and with what consequences a “regulatory security state” has emerged in various fields and polities of European and global security policy making. Unlike the “positive security state”, which relies on political authority and vast state capacities, the regulatory security state governs by rules and heavily draws on epistemic authority (i.e. superior expertise) to make and legitimate security policies. Features of the regulatory security state, such as the power of (state and non-state) experts, rules-based policy instruments and indirect modes of governance, have come to shape many “new” and “traditional” fields of security such as cybersecurity and armament. Participants in this research-oriented seminar studied their manifestations, causes and consequences but also countervailing trends and controversies. After a set of introductory sessions, which took the conceptual apparatus of the “regulatory state” to the field of security and discussed current theoretical debates, students designed and implemented their own research projects on the regulatory security state in particular (established or new) security fields and (national or supranational) polities.

For further request: andreas.kruck{at}gsi.uni-muenchen.de; moritz.weiss{at}gsi.lmu.de

BA Seminar, Winter Term 2022/23

Experts in Global Politics

Andreas Kruck

This seminar studied the role of experts in global politics. Not only in national political systems but also at the international level, public expert bodies such as specialized EU agencies and non-state experts such as networks of scientists, private standard-setters or global tech companies shape the making and implementation of policies in various issue-areas. Much of contemporary global governance is based on epistemic authority, i.e. actors’ recognized claims of superior expertise. At the same time, experts and their authority are often contested and part of deeply political power struggles. What makes experts powerful in global politics? Through what mechanisms do experts shape the processes and outputs of global policy-making? When do policy-makers follow the advice of experts, when do they ignore it? Does expertise-based governance enhance the effectiveness of global policy-making? How legitimate is “expertocracy” in the global realm? To what extent do powerful experts mitigate, reproduce or even reinforce socio-economic, gender-based and postcolonial discrimination? We addressed these (and other) questions from a broad range of both explanatory and critical theories. We looked at various types of public and, in particular, non-state experts in diverse issue-areas (such as security, finance, health, environment etc.), covering several venues of global policy-making such as international organizations, transgovernmental networks and private transnational standardization. In their presentations, participants to this class conducted theoretically informed and methodologically sound case studies.

For further request: andreas.kruck{at}gsi.uni-muenchen.de