Visions of International Studies in a New Millennium

Abstract

We live in interesting times. The last two decades of the twentieth century played host to dramatic changes in almost every aspect and walk of life. The world community is in the midst of extremely turbulent and unsettling times. From our own personal experiences, we know that the lives of international studies professionals have not been spared the impact of these changes. Intellectually, we cope with the implications of the end of the Cold War, the globalization of the world political economy, the impact of the Internet, and a plethora of new phenomena that we have only begun to understand and synthesize theoretically, conceptually, and empirically. Academically, we face forces working to transform higher education through the application of business principles of management to a most often decidedly nonbusiness environment. We confront rhetoric and pressure urging us to change our methods of teaching age-old concepts. We must cope with a requirement of greater accountability for the amount and types of work we do in our "privileged" academic environments and the implications various approaches to accountability have on how we pursue our careers in academia~Trow, 1998!. Politically and socially, we are challenged to demonstrate the applicability of our work in relation to the problems in the world around us. Merely thinking great thoughts in our ivory towers is not enough; we must demonstrate our International Studies Perspectives~2000! 1, 1-9.

Do Simulations Enhance Student Learning? An Empirical Evaluation of an IR Simulation

“…Overall, the results in Table 2 suggest that, according to the students' selfassessment, the simulation enhances their knowledge of international relations, they enjoy the exercise, and the simulation stimulates interest. Stice (1987) and Boyer et al (2000) both show that students learn more by ''doing'' and ''saying'' things than by reading and listening. In response, we developed a simulation that incorporates more ''doing'' and ''saying'' to enhance student learning.…”

Playing Games with International Relations

“…A growing number of economics professors are moving from using simulations in their experimental work to using them as teaching tools (Gremmen and Potters, 1997) and in a recent survey 97.5% of business schools reported using simulations to teach their students (Faria, 1998:295). This same trend exists in the teaching of international relations 1 (IR) motivated by recent findings that, “… students retain 10% of what they read, 20% of what they hear, 30% of what they see, 50% of what they see and hear, 70% of what they say, and 90% of what they do and say together” (Boyer, Caprioli, Denemark, Hanson, and Steven, 2000:4).…”

Promise and Performance: An Evaluation of Journals in International Relations

“…Is there evidence that international relations is indeed an eclectic field (Hermann 1998;Boyer et al 2000)? Or does there continue to be evidence of ''parochialism'' (Holsti 1985; see also Strange 1995;Waever 1998)?…”