Threat Financing and Anti-Money Laundering
is a class that provides an overview of the world of money laundering, terrorist financing, and sanctions. It delves into how these areas are handled by governments around the world, especially focusing on the United States and its reach overseas. The class does a deep dive into the realm of compliance programs and the regulations and laws that apply to financial institutions, such as banks, brokerage firms, and investment advisers; to money services businesses, including money transmitters and the hawala system; and to gambling entities, including those that are online as well as casinos. Fines issued to various entities will be analyzed, such as the $3 billion fine imposed upon TD Bank in the fall of 2024, as well as criminal penalties that have been imposed on individuals and entities.
A review of how funds are moved, such as via the transfer of real estate, art, and jewelry, will be conducted. Some guest speakers who handle such issues on a daily basis will be brought in to provide their analysis. In this class, the perspective of law enforcement, regulators, and compliance personnel will be presented.
MPA-DP Registration Priority.
This course provides a comprehensive introduction to the major global health challenges facing low- and middle-income countries and their implications for sustainable development. Organized into thematic modules, the course covers foundational topics in global health, key disease burdens such as HIV, TB, and malaria, maternal and child health, nutrition, epidemic preparedness, and the evolving role of technologies and financing in global health systems.
Instruction integrates expert guest lectures, case studies, and policy discussions to examine effective health interventions and implementation barriers. Students will critically assess global health strategies, analyze policy responses, and engage with real-world applications.
IFEP Concentration Registration Priority.
This course explores both the theory and policy of international trade. In the first half, students will learn why countries trade, what determines trade patterns, and how trade affects prices, welfare, and income distribution. Key models covered include the Ricardian, Specific Factors, and Heckscher-Ohlin models, along with extensions on migration and offshoring. In the second half, the course focuses on trade policy instruments such as tariffs, quotas, and subsidies, examining their effects under different market structures. Topics include the political economy of trade, strategic trade policy, climate and agricultural subsidies, and international trade agreements. Prior coursework in microeconomics is required. Students will develop both analytical and applied understanding of global trade issues.
This workshop-style course introduces students to the principles of social entrepreneurship and human-centered design. Working in teams, students will identify pressing social or environmental challenges, conduct stakeholder research, and develop new venture ideas through iterative prototyping, budgeting, and pitching. The course emphasizes design thinking methodologies and includes instruction in customer discovery, solution testing, and storytelling for social impact.
Through hands-on collaboration and expert feedback, students will build a viable social enterprise plan—nonprofit, for-profit, or hybrid—and present their venture to potential partners and funders. Ideal for students who want to develop an idea, contribute to a team, or explore the tools and mindset needed to launch a mission-driven venture.
CEE Concentration Registration Priority.
The course provides an overview of different ways of conceptualizing the relationship between politics, environmental change, and economic processes. While it embeds these paradigms in a history of the growth of capitalism, the inter-state system, and scientific progress, it concentrates on the global environment of the 20th and 21st-century world, with particular attention to developing countries and their dilemmas. Ideologies, material processes, and institutions are critically examined to analyze how our ways of ‘knowing’ and changing the environment cannot be understood separate from social relations and power dynamics. By covering many subjects and drawing on many local and global examples,
Fundamentals of Environmental Policy
intends to give students a solid grasp of key academic debates and the complex trade-offs inherent in crafting environmental and development policies.
IFEP Concentration Registration Priority.
This course examines the intersection of international politics and international economics. It covers an analysis of the historical background to and contemporary reality of the political economy of international trade, finance, monetary relations, foreign investment, and climate policy; problems of economic development; and globalization.
As long as societies have gone to war, commanders have had to consider how they will treat captives. It can be a factor at every stage of a struggle, from negotiations to avert war, tactics and strategy for winning, and post-conflict resolution. And long after the end of fighting, the experience of captivity can continue to shape how people recall and commemorate their history. This course examines how generations of lawmakers, diplomats, military commanders and activists have dealt with the problem of captivity. It will also explore the experience of the captives themselves, as well as their guards, including those guards who themselves were made prisoner after being accused of war crimes. Students will become familiar not just with different kinds of modern conflict, but also the diff`erent disciplinary methods for studying it, from sociology and political science to philosophy and international law.
This course equips students with both time-honored and cutting-edge advocacy skills to advance and protect human rights. Working on a current issue of their choice, students will develop a full advocacy strategy, defining goals, identifying targets, and selecting tactics grounded in rigorous research.
Using real-world case studies, the course explores how successful campaigns are built, including coalition-building, media engagement, and advocacy with UN bodies and national policymakers. Students will analyze what makes campaigns effective and how to adapt strategies across different political and institutional contexts. Students will also debate how human rights advocacy can meet the challenge of the rise of authoritarian power, closing civic space, dramatic reductions in funding, and human rights threats exacerbated by new technologies.
Throughout the semester, students will develop a toolkit of practical skills widely used in the human rights field. Assignments are designed to mirror professional advocacy work and include drafting advocacy letters, op-eds, and submissions to UN mechanisms or treaty bodies, as well as producing a final advocacy strategy.
The course includes a diverse set of guest speakers who have designed and led impactful advocacy and also features interactive simulations, giving students hands-on experience with engaging policymakers and communicating persuasively in high-stakes settings.
This course introduces students to the diverse methodologies, actors, and outputs involved in human rights research and reporting. Students will examine how governments, international organizations, NGOs, and journalists approach documentation and advocacy, while developing skills in interviewing, document analysis, data collection, and report writing. The course emphasizes ethical considerations, sociocultural awareness, and gender sensitivity throughout the research and reporting process.
Through case studies, simulations, and guest speakers, students will explore the strategic use of human rights documentation in advancing justice and accountability. Assignments include analytical reflections, response papers, and a final research report tailored to one of the core reporting perspectives studied.
This course explores how human-centered design and innovation methods are used to drive public-sector change. Students will learn how to apply design tools to complex policy and service delivery challenges while also engaging with the ethical, philosophical, and institutional questions that shape civic innovation work. Weekly sessions follow the full arc of a design-based innovation project, from scoping and research to prototyping and implementation, paired with critical themes such as power, embodiment, ethics, and systems change.
Students will practice design methodologies, develop speculative future policy proposals, and refine storytelling skills for public impact. The course culminates in a PechaKucha presentation reflecting personal insights into innovation practice.
This course explores the evolving relationship between the private sector and human rights, with emphasis on legal frameworks, global standards, and practical approaches to corporate accountability. Students examine the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and other key instruments that shape responsible business conduct across sectors.
Through case studies, role-playing exercises, and guest speakers, students analyze human rights risks and strategies in industries such as apparel, extractives, finance, and tech. Topics include human rights due diligence, corporate complicity, responsible disengagement, and litigation. The course equips students to assess business conduct, engage stakeholders, and advance rights-based accountability.
CEE Concentration Registration Priority.
This course introduces students to the structure and strategy of international project finance in the energy sector, with emphasis on projects central to the global energy transition and LNG market expansion. Through real-world case studies and hands-on modeling exercises, students will analyze project risks, develop risk ratings, and assess cashflows to determine equity returns and lender credit metrics.
Topics include contract structuring, completion and market risk mitigation, the role of development finance institutions, renewable energy incentives, and evolving trends in merchant power and virtual PPAs. Students will examine investment drivers for energy infrastructure and gain a practical understanding of how project economics align with capital source expectations. The course concludes with student team presentations applying course concepts to real-world energy finance challenges.
Enrollment in this course is restricted to students who have officially declared the CEE concentration, as reflected in their Stellic profile. If space allows, enrollment may be extended to additional students at a later date.
This course examines the political and ethical challenges of confronting historical violence and the demands for redress in transitional, democratic, and post-conflict societies. Through case studies from across the globe, students explore how memory, historical responsibility, and justice intersect in efforts toward reconciliation. The course analyzes evolving norms around historical redress, reparations, and accountability, particularly in light of expanding debates on colonialism, race, and slavery in established democracies. Topics include the emergence of transitional justice, the politics of reparations, competing narratives of victimization, and the contested role of history in national and international reconciliation efforts.
CEE Concentration Registration Priority.
This seminar examines the development of utility-scale renewable energy projects from the perspective of project developers while exploring the roles of key stakeholders, including regulators, policymakers, utilities and other offtakers, equipment suppliers, financiers, and local communities. Through case studies of recent and ongoing projects in different regions of the world, students analyze how technology, policy, permitting, global supply chains, project finance, energy markets, construction, and existing infrastructure shape project outcomes. The course follows the renewable energy development process from site and technology selection through permitting, financing, construction, and operations. It also examines major policy initiatives and political developments that influence renewable energy deployment, including industrial policy, tax incentives, tariffs, and regulatory frameworks. Students will develop an understanding of the factors that determine project success and evaluate the policy and market levers available to accelerate the energy transition.
In May 2016, the UN Human Rights Council passed a highly contested resolution condemning discrimination and violence based on sexual orientation and gender identity, and establishing the first-ever Independent Expert on these issues. The protracted debate surrounding the resolution underscored how lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) rights remain among the most contentious topics in international human rights, law, and public policy.
Disputes over LGBTI rights are often framed as a clash between ‘human rights’ and ‘traditional values,’ highlighting a central challenge in advancing LGBTI claims: how to assert universal principles based on identities that are historically contingent and culturally shaped.
This course examines how LGBTI rights intersect with broader debates in areas such as bilateral relations and good governance, while also addressing challenges including legal recognition of same-sex partnerships and transgender identities. It explores the political uses of anti-LGBTI sentiment and investigates how LGBTI rights become flashpoints for deeper societal and political divisions.
Students will reflect on the complexities of advancing LGBTI rights in transnational contexts, engage with current scholarly debates, and develop the tools to address LGBTI rights across academic and professional domains. Contemporary developments and breaking news will be integrated into course discussions and assignments.
CEE Concentration Registration Priority.
Carbon pricing has become a central tool in global climate policy, with over 70 jurisdictions implementing carbon taxes or emissions trading systems that now cover more than one quarter of global emissions. This course explores how carbon markets and taxes are designed, reformed, and evaluated, using real-world case studies from Europe, the Americas, Asia, and beyond.
Students will engage with a structured, step-by-step framework for designing effective carbon pricing policies across sectors, including energy, transportation, industry, and land use. The course examines market-based mechanisms such as cap-and-trade, carbon taxes, and crediting programs, along with emerging policy innovations and debates around integrity and equity.
Topics include carbon border adjustments, voluntary markets, the role of carbon pricing in trade, investment, and corporate climate strategies, and the intersection of pricing with complementary policies. Students will assess existing policies, model policy impacts, and develop informed policy proposals.
Fall 2026 Course Dates: September 18 & October 2, 2026.
This simulation course is a short two-day course designed to enable participating students to weigh and apply human rights principles, best practices, and standards to simulated human rights emergencies. The simulation exercise challenges student participants with issues facing human rights practitioners when responding to human rights crises and provides practice operating within the human rights system and devising innovative solutions to complex challenges. Participants will evaluate data reports, assess relevant human rights tools and mechanisms, and propose interventions. The simulation will include a day of simultaneous exercises, followed by another day of debriefing, evaluation, and identification of key challenges and lessons.
CEE Concentration Registration Priority.
Existing energy sources and the infrastructures that deliver them are undergoing a period of rapid change. Limits to growth, fluctuating raw material prices, and the emergence of new technologies contribute to heightened risk and opportunity in the energy sector. This course aims to establish a core energy skill set for students and prepare them for more advanced coursework by introducing a foundational language and toolset for analyzing energy issues.
Through both theoretical and practical approaches, students will examine how energy technologies are developed, financed, and deployed. The course highlights root drivers of change in the industry, emerging technologies, and the critical factors that influence their successful commercialization. Understanding these dynamics is also essential to designing effective energy policy aligned with broader social welfare goals.
By the end of the course, students will have a working knowledge of conventional and emerging forms of energy generation and delivery. They will also develop the analytical tools to assess which technologies may succeed, which may not, and what innovations may help drive further deployment.
Enrollment in this course is restricted to students who have officially declared the CEE concentration, as reflected in their Stellic profile. If space allows, enrollment may be extended to additional students at a later date.
IFEP Concentration Registration Priority. Prerequisite: SIPA IA6200 Accounting.
(Note: Based on their performance in SIPA IA6260 Accounting Fundamentals, IA6260 students may be allowed to register if space remains.)
This course provides an introduction to corporate finance, focusing on how firms assess funding needs, evaluate investment opportunities, and select financing strategies. The course equips future policymakers and practitioners with core analytical tools in financial decision-making. Topics include working capital management, cost of capital, security valuation, capital structure, and free cash flow analysis. Emphasis is placed on applying financial concepts to real-world situations through case studies, quantitative problem sets, and hands-on modeling. Students will gain exposure to Excel-based analysis and decision-making under uncertainty. Prior coursework in accounting is required, and fluency in Excel is essential.
This course is designed to introduce the student to routine and episodic primary care of the pediatric patient. The focus will be placed on age-appropriate physical, cognitive, and emotional development, as well as frequently encountered illnesses seen in an outpatient setting.
D&G Concentration Registration Priority.
This course will provide students with a framework for historical and current debates on development. It will offer students a basic understanding of what constitutes “development” (ends) and how to promote it (means). The initial lecture presents the broad issue of development trends and the multidisciplinary approach, as seen today through the Sustainable Development Goals adopted by the United Nations in 2015. The subsequent classes then look at classical and contemporary theories of economic development. They will be followed by a critical comparative analysis of development experiences. A series of lectures will then concentrate on institutional issues, social development, and environmental sustainability (climate change).
This interdisciplinary course examines the complex intersections of climate science, human rights, and sustainable development. Students will first explore the fundamentals of Earth’s climate systems and core human rights frameworks. The course then analyzes how global climate disruption intersects with social vulnerability, equity, and justice. Topics include the science of climate variability, international climate governance, climate change litigation, migration and displacement, adaptation strategies, and sector-specific impacts on food, health, and livelihoods. Special attention is given to the experiences of frontline communities and small island states, as well as to policy responses grounded in climate justice.
Students examine the issue of violence against women and families. The demographics of the population, theories of domestic violence, crisis intervention, and short- and long-term clinical issues will be examined, as will service modalities for women victims and survivors, batterers, and their children.
This graduate seminar analyzes and compares national security strategies, including military doctrine, alliance policies, and foreign economic policy. The course examines how international structure, domestic politics, and leadership psychology contribute to policy outcomes. Students will explore how different strategies serve as stabilizing or destabilizing forces in the international system.
Specific topics include great power strategies before the two World Wars, American Cold War containment strategy, China's Cold War strategies, and sources of stability and instability since the Cold War’s end.
Students should have a strong background in international relations theory and/or international security. Those without such preparation are permitted to enroll but may find it difficult to keep up with the readings.
As governments, multilateral organizations, philanthropies, corporations, and impact investors face increasing pressure to demonstrate meaningful and lasting results, the ability to generate and use credible evidence has become central to advancing sustainable development. This course examines how impact measurement and evaluation (M&E) supports decision-making across these sectors, combining technical rigor with real-world application. Students will learn to design theories of change, monitoring and evaluation frameworks, impact measurement and management (IMM) systems, and evaluation approaches while exploring how different organizations define and measure impact, navigate trade-offs related to scale and sustainability, and use evidence to strengthen learning, accountability, and strategic decision-making. Through applied cases and a semester-long client project, students will develop practical skills for designing M&E strategies that respond to complex development challenges.
This course introduces students to major historical and contemporary debates on Latin American economic development and its social consequences. It adopts a comparative perspective, examining the region’s trajectory relative to North America, Western Europe, East Asia, and other developing regions. Particular attention is given to the institutional, political, geographic, and social factors that help explain Latin America’s comparatively low long-run growth, productivity, equality, and social development.
The course begins with long-term economic trends and competing explanations for the region’s relative performance. It then examines the colonial legacy, including institutions, labor systems, landholding patterns, and state formation, comparing Latin America with other world regions. The course also explores post-independence development, the effects of the Industrial Revolution, and the export era from the late nineteenth century to 1929.
The course then examines Latin American economic development during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, including the Great Depression, World War II, state-led industrialization, the debt crisis, the lost decade of the 1980s, market-oriented reforms, and recent economic transformations. These experiences are compared with East Asia, advanced economies, and other developing regions. The final section addresses current issues, including macroeconomic policy, trade, structural transformation, inequality, labor markets, social policy, technological change, climate transition, demographic slowdown, recent global crises, and Latin America’s future development prospects.
This case-based seminar explores the evolving role of nonprofit organizations and their partnerships with government and business in advancing social impact. Students will examine the structure, challenges, and opportunities within the nonprofit sector, including social entrepreneurship, public-private partnerships, and venture philanthropy. The course emphasizes real-world cases across global contexts and diverse sectors such as housing, health, education, environmental conservation, and urban development. Through discussion, stakeholder role-play, and group presentations, students will deepen their understanding of how cross-sector collaboration can scale solutions to public challenges and create lasting value.