International Disasters

6 Credits · Level: Graduate, Undergraduate

The International Disasters course is a graduate seminar that challenges students to grow in their knowledge and understanding horizontally beyond the borders of domestic U.S. emergency management principles and vertically beyond national policies into global frameworks. Students will be introduced to threats and hazards with global implications, how those threats/hazards shape the systems that exist to mitigate, respond, or recover from them, and the complexities that exist in international disaster operations. This course will focus on the United States Government’s (USG) organization for responding to international disasters, how emergency/disaster management is structured in other nations, and how nations come together to respond to an international disaster. Students will be introduced to case studies and presented scenarios that will require considering factors such as interpretation of complex international arrangements, political climates, economic environments, social/media influences, and state sovereignty. Throughout the course, students will receive lectures expanding on the week’s topics by the instructor, have opportunities to interact with guest lecturers and engage in discussions with other classmates. The residency week will not only expand on the topics during the preceding weeks but will also layer further discussion on the complexities of international disaster operations such as initial coordination, logistics, command, and control, among others.