Peace and Justice Studies (KROC)

KROC 470 | WAR, GENDER AND PEACEBUILDING

Units: 2 Repeatability: No

Non-Core Attributes: Experiential

This course explores the peacebuilding roles that women play in conflict zones around the world. Like traditional courses, it will include an introduction to gender and peacebuilding and an analysis of women’s leadership in human rights activism and conflict resolution. However, this unique course is built around the involvement of four women peacemakers from conflict zones around the world who will play an active role in the classroom and help us explore how power, oppression, and gendered identities contribute to war and peace from the personal to the societal levels. Through a series of expert lectures, case studies, interactive exercises, and mixed media presentations, students will gain increased understanding about gender and peacebuilding, including the gendered drivers of conflict, and the different roles women and men play supporting, preventing, mitigating, and resolving conflict.

KROC 471 | IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM IN PRACTICE

Units: 3 Repeatability: No

The course begins with a comprehensive review of the origins and substance of U.S. immigration and asylum law, with a special emphasis on how they interface with the broader history of international humanitarian and human rights norms. Students will then work with staff of the Trans-Border Initiative (TBI) to provide expert testimony for asylum claims filed by individuals fleeing persecution in contemporary Mexico and Central America. Working with the most important national and local networks of pro bono immigration attorneys in the country, the students will assist TBI staff in verifying and reinforcing the most important facts and claims in each case, and preparing effective, thorough, and well-documented expert testimony. Students will mobilize the underlying research and their experience working on the individual cases to develop policy briefs of specific aspects of immigration and asylum policy. Each student will produce a significant written contribution to at least one actual asylum case, one fact sheet, and one policy brief to be published by TBI. In addition to a broad introduction to immigration and asylum law grounded in the practice of real-world cases, the students will learn to work collaboratively, designing and dividing up particular research tasks on hard deadlines, and they will learn to ask effective questions of the lawyers, the asylum seekers, and a variety of experts. The course will meet once per week for 3 hours, and students will be expected to complete approximately 10 hours per week of reading and research.

KROC 472 | TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE

Units: 3 Repeatability: No

This course examines the range of possible legal, institutional and policy frameworks that have been marshaled in an attempt to respond to large-scale human rights atrocities in the wake of conflict, from tribunals to truth commissions and beyond. It also examines debates about stopping ongoing mass atrocities through “humanitarian intervention” and the “responsibility to protect” doctrine.

KROC 490 | SPECIAL TOPICS SEMINAR

Units: 2 Repeatability: Yes (Can be repeated for Credit)

A course focusing on a special topic in peace and justice studies, conflict management and resolution, or social innovation. The course content and structure will differ depending on instructor. See learning objectives for more information about the specific course, and consult your advisor for the full course description.

KROC 494 | SPECIAL TOPICS COURSE

Units: 3 Repeatability: Yes (Can be repeated for Credit)

A course focusing on a special topic in peace and justice studies, conflict management and resolution, or social innovation. The course content and structure will differ depending on instructor. See learning objectives for more information about the specific course, and consult your advisor for the full course description.

KROC 497 | PROFESSIONAL PORTFOLIO

Units: 1 Repeatability: No

The Kroc School equips changemakers. This course will help you to link the concepts, skills, and work-products developed in your time here with the professional requirements of the industry you wish to enter or return to upon graduation. In particular, this course will provide the time and support required to compile a professional portfolio comprised of the items specified by your degree program. The Portfolio contains a Curriculum Vitae highlighting your accomplishments to date, a cover letter, and a reflective essay, which serves as a coherent framework for drawing together lessons learned from your studies, and articulates your professional goals and trajectory. The rest of the Portfolio is comprised of work products from portfolio-eligible projects in your courses such as policy memos, strategy memos, articles, and grant applications. During class meetings we will work to identify and refine these work products, and how to showcase your accomplishments for a professional audience.

KROC 499 | INDEPENDENT STUDY

Units: 1-3 Repeatability: Yes (Repeatable if topic differs)

An independent study for up to three units provides students an opportunity to research a topic of particular interest to them relevant to Peace and Justice Studies. The faculty supervisor, program director and Dean of the Joan B. Kroc School of Peace Studies must approve the project proposal prior to the beginning of the relevant semester. This course may be repeated up to a maximum of three units.