Program Overview

Program Overview

The University of Copenhagen offers a course titled "Maritime Security: Research at the Ocean Frontier" (ASTK18180U). This course is part of the university's program in Political Science and is available to full-degree students, exchange and guest students, credit students, and open university students.

Course Description

Maritime security is a thriving field of international activity, with issues such as piracy, extremist violence at sea, and environmental crimes becoming major international political concerns. This seminar reviews the problems, institutions, actors, and responses of maritime security in the light of contemporary international relations theory. The course provides a concise introduction to security problems at sea and how to situate and analyze them.

Learning Outcomes

Upon completing this course, students will gain an in-depth understanding of contemporary maritime security challenges and how different international actors respond to them. They will also learn core analytical skills, including summarizing, processing, interpreting, and presenting information, as well as how to write integrative literature reviews and encyclopedic articles.

Literature

The course draws on a range of literature, including:

• Bueger, Christian. 2015. What is Maritime Security?, Marine Policy 53: 159-164.
• Urbina, Ian. 2015. The Outlaw Ocean, New York Times Series.
• Bueger, Christian and Tim Edmunds. 2017. Beyond Seablindness: A New Agenda for Maritime Security Studies, International Affairs 93(6): 1293–1311.
• Nye, Joseph S. 1975. “Ocean Rule Making from a World Politics Perspective.” Ocean Development & International Law 3(1): 29–52.
• Havice, Elizabeth, and Anna Zalik. 2018. “Ocean Frontiers: Epistemologies, Jurisdictions, Commodifications.” International Social Science Journal 68(229–230): 219–35.
• Voyer, Michelle et al. 2018. “Maritime Security and the Blue Economy: Intersections and Interdependencies in the Indian Ocean.” Journal of the Indian Ocean Region 14(1): 28–48.
• Steinberg, Philip E. 2001. The Social Construction of the Ocean. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Teaching and Learning Methods

Teaching and learning are through seminars, presentations, and the development of a research project.

Workload

The course has a total workload of 28 hours, with 28 hours of class instruction.

Assessment

The course is assessed through a written examination, with a free written assignment. The marking scale is a 7-point grading scale, and there is no external censorship.

Exam Criteria

The criteria for exam assessment are as follows:

• Grade 12 is given for an outstanding performance, where the student lives up to the course's goal description in an independent and convincing manner with no or few and minor shortcomings.
• Grade 7 is given for a good performance, where the student is confidently able to live up to the goal description, albeit with several shortcomings.
• Grade 02 is given for an adequate performance, where the minimum acceptable performance is demonstrated, and the student is only able to live up to the goal description in an insecure and incomplete manner.

Course Information

• Language: English
• Course code: ASTK18180U
• Credit: 7.5 ECTS
• Level: Full Degree Master, Bachelor
• Duration: 1 semester
• Placement: Spring
• The course is also available as continuing and professional education.

Study Board and Contracting Departments

The study board for this course is the Department of Political Science, Study Council. The contracting departments are the Department of Political Science and Social Data Science, and the contracting faculty is the Faculty of Social Sciences.

Course Coordinators

The course coordinator is Christian Bueger.