Politics Is A Contact Sport

3 Credits · Level: Graduate

How would you like to be a Cabinet official making policy from the Situation Room at the White House? Or perhaps play a US Senator negotiating a major tax reform bill? This course will permit you to do all those things, while learning practical policymaking skills you can use in your career. Taught by a former senior policymaking official in both the White House and Congress, this course is designed to give students hands-on experience in policymaking. The course uses simulations in which students play actual policymakers facing life-like policy situations. The course focuses on “money politics” issues, like international trade, tax reform, budget politics, and monetary policy. The simulations are specially designed to force students to confront the hard challenges facing senior policymakers every day. Class simulations will include: • A meeting in the Situation Room of the White House to determine international trade policy toward China. • A United Nations international climate change negotiation, with software graphically demonstrating just how much your negotiations helped the global environment. This will be followed by simulations of a Senate hearing, then a Senate mark-up of the agreement. • A mark-up in the Senate Finance Committee to hammer out final details of tax reform legislation. • Other simulations featuring the 2008 financial crisis, Congressional budget negotiations, and election prediction skills. Each simulation is designed to teach certain core and essential policymaking skills. These include: 1) Framing Policymaking Options; 2) Making Smart Policymaking Decisions; 3) Political Negotiation; 4) Political Communications; 5) The Use of Game Theory in Policymaking; 7) Crisis Policymaking; 8) International Policymaking; and 9) the Human Dimensions of Policymaking. Students of the course will emerge with an elevated “touch” for the policy process and an enhanced ability to manage the multi-dimensional complexities of top policymaking. Although the course will be based on U.S. Government simulations, non-U.S. students will also benefit. They will gain greater insight into the workings of the U.S. Government. As one non-US student commented, “This course elevated my understanding of the U.S. political system.” Also, the lessons learned in this class are applicable to any country’s political system – and to any future professional career.