NS3028 Comparative Government for Homeland Security

Offered through the Center for Homeland Defense and Security. The objectives of the NS3028 course are: (1) to understand the trans-national nature of terrorism, organized crime, pandemics and other homeland security threats, (2) to assess homeland security strategies employed by liberal democracies around the world; (3) to distill and extrapolate policy implications from these examples; and (4) to apply these lessons to the organizational and functional challenges faced by homeland security leaders in the United States. The course will focus both on a discussion of shared threats such as the global Jihadi movement, Al-Qaeda activity in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Middle Eastern groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah as well as policies and strategies employed by a range of democratic countries to cope with terrorism and other homeland security related threats. In addition to looking at specific countries, the course will also look at issue areas such as bio-threats, health system preparedness, airport security and anti-radicalization policies across countries. This course will provide students with a knowledge base and methodology with which to learn from the practices of other countries and translate those practices into policies applicable in the United States. The course will also enable students to better understand the threats that other countries face (many of which are likely to affect the United States in the near term) and how they cope with those threats. Finally, the course will enable students to be prepared to engage with their international partners at the local, state or federal levels as Homeland Security becomes an increasingly global undertaking and all levels of government in the United States move toward conducting greater international outreach. Prerequisite: None.

Lecture Hours

4

Lab Hours

0

Course Learning Outcomes

• Critically examine foreign homeland security strategies, policies, and practices through analysis of the historical, political, economic, and legal factors that underpin homeland security policy in a range of countries. Students will consider the role and interplay of institutions in other countries and assess the risks and consequences of homeland security policies in those countries. Additionally, students will understand homeland security threats and challenges facing these countries and assess preparedness and resilience in these countries.
• Using an interdisciplinary range of sources, ideas, and practice, and employing a comparative methodology, students will apply creativity and critical-thinking skills to analyze and evaluate foreign institutions, missions, capabilities, interests, equities, and limitations of the homeland security enterprise in a range of countries.
• Students will consider how historical, political, social, and ethical factors can affect homeland security policymaking in a range of foreign countries. Students will consider a range of models of leadership that exist in these countries and derive lessons from institutional dynamics and communication with diverse constituencies as evident in these countries.
• Students will build on their existing research and writing skills as they learn and apply the comparative method to analyze the degree of applicability of various successful foreign strategies, policies, and/or practices to agencies in the United States. Students will refine their abilities to identify, evaluate, and integrate source materials; assess and address their own analytical biases, and analyze how complexity and change define the homeland security discourse in other countries. Students will create knowledge that has academic and/or practical value, informing policy discussions and enriching the literature on homeland security.
• Students will develop innovative approaches to improving the effectiveness and efficiency of the homeland security enterprise by using the comparative methodology to understand diverse frames of reference overseas and assess practicality and utility of applying foreign approaches to implement US homeland security goals and objectives. Students will assess novel concepts and ideas based on foreign practices in order to prompt informed discussions among homeland security and defense policymakers and professionals about strategy, policy, resource management, and operational constraints.