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Course Syllabus

Bachelor 2025/2026

History of International Relations

Type: Compulsory course (Political Science and World Politics)
Delivered by: Department of Political Science and International Affairs
Where: Saint-Petersburg School of Social Sciences
When: 1 year, 3, 4 module
Open to: students of one campus
Instructors: Алексеев Даниил Олегович, Stanislav Mazhinskiy, Maxim Savinykh, Киселева Дарья Александровна
Language: English
ECTS credits: 5
Contact hours: 60

Course Syllabus

Full SyllabusAsk Question

Abstract

The course describes the history of international relations. It includes basic dates, concepts, theories.
Learning Objectives

Learning Objectives

  • The main learning objectives are: - To develop a systemic understanding of the development of international relations in the modern and contemporary periods. - To form an understanding the origins of the problems of modern international relations. - To identify patterns in the historical process in international relations.
Expected Learning Outcomes

Expected Learning Outcomes

  • Analyzes and interprets the logic of the development of the international relations system
  • Interprets trends and patterns in the development of international relations in modern and contemporary times
  • Describes and explains the source base for research on international issues
  • Characterizes the main directions of the foreign policy of leading states
  • Characterizes the interaction and interdependence of regional communities within the Westphalian and Vienna, Versailles-Washington, and Yalta-Potsdam systems of international relations
  • Interprets reasons and purposes of international conflicts
  • Analyzes politics of the Great Powers and its policy in different regions of the world
  • Describes and explains controversial issues of countries negotiations
  • Indicates circumstances and impacts of international conflicts
  • Determines of main factors in Great Powers' negotiations
  • Evaluates current international relations features and trends, issues and negotiation
Course Contents

Course Contents

  • International relations theory: methods and approaches
  • Origins of International Relations
  • Westphalian system of international relations
  • The balance of power in Europe in the second half of the 17th-18th centuries
  • Vienna system of international relations
  • International relations during the First World War
  • Versailles-Washington system
  • The destruction of the post-war system of global governance
  • International relations during the Second World War
  • Bipolar system
  • Post Bipolar Sysytem
Assessment Elements

Assessment Elements

  • non-blocking Lecture Quiz
    At the beginning of every lecture students follow special link for quiz about previous lecture materials. It will contain 3-5 questions.
  • non-blocking In-class activity
    Lecturer evaluates students’ progress, including comprehension of lecture materials and assigned readings, as well as contribution to discussions. The component is calculated as an average grade achieved on all seminars. If a student is not able to attend the seminar due to illness or any other legitimate reason (relevant document should be provided), he/she is not graded for that seminar. A student can complete the tasks for a missed class and receive a grade. But in this case, the student cannot receive the maximum grade. In all other cases students are graded with 0 for the seminar they have missed.
  • non-blocking Mid-term test
    At the last seminar of the third module students will take the test.
  • non-blocking Final test
Interim Assessment

Interim Assessment

  • 2025/2026 4th module
    0.25 * Final test + 0.15 * In-class activity + 0.15 * In-class activity + 0.1 * Lecture Quiz + 0.1 * Lecture Quiz + 0.25 * Mid-term test
Bibliography

Bibliography

Recommended Core Bibliography

  • 9781000430295 - David L. Hoffmann - The Memory of the Second World War in Soviet and Post-Soviet Russia - 2021 - Routledge - https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=nlebk&AN=2763252 - nlebk - 2763252
  • Acharya, A., & Buzan, B. (2007). Why is there no non-Western international relations theory? An introduction. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsbas&AN=edsbas.712B98E3
  • America, Russia, and the Cold War 1945-1980, LaFeber, W., 1980
  • B. F. Martynov. (2019). Chaos Synergy, Geopolitics And Culture Explain History Of International Relations. A Critique of William Wohlforth. Vestnik MGIMO-Universiteta, (1(64)), 19. https://doi.org/10.24833/2071-8160-2019-1-64-19-28
  • Babiracki, P., Zimmer, K., & David-Fox, M. (2014). Cold War Crossings : International Travel and Exchange Across the Soviet Bloc, 1940s-1960s: Vol. First edition. Texas A&M University Press.
  • Baldwin, D. A. (2016). Power and International Relations : A Conceptual Approach. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=1090916
  • Brooks, S. G. (2001). Power, Globalization, and the End of the Cold War. International Security, 25(3), 5. https://doi.org/10.1162/016228800560516
  • Brown, A. (2007). Perestroika and the End of the Cold War. Cold War History, 7(1), 1. https://doi.org/10.1080/14682740701197631
  • Buzan, B. (2007). People, States and Fear : An Agenda for International Security Studies in the Post-Cold War Era (Vol. Second edition). Colchester, England: ECPR Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=1468309
  • Chakrabarti, P. N. (2018). History of International Relations. [N.p.]: New Central Book Agency. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=2239647
  • Christian Reus-Smit, & Duncan Snidal. (2010). The Oxford Handbook of International Relations: Vol. [Paperback edition.]. OUP Oxford.
  • Classical and modern thought on international relations: from anarchy to cosmopolits, Jackson, R., 2005
  • Conceptualizing International Practices: Directions for the Practice Turn in International Relations, , 2022
  • Douglas, R. M. (2012). Orderly and Humane : The Expulsion of the Germans After the Second World War. New Haven [Conn.]: Yale University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=458500
  • Fink, C. (2017). Cold War : An International History. Boulder, CO: Routledge. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=1451271
  • Forsberg, T. V. (DE-588)1057426903, (DE-627)795928734, (DE-576)413433900, aut. (2019). Russia and the European security order revisited from the congress of Vienna to the post-cold war Tuomas Forsberg. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edswao&AN=edswao.1662988672
  • FOX, A. (2019). Commemorating the First World War. New Zealand Journal of History, 53(1), 77–89. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=30h&AN=136246507
  • Gatrell, P. (1999). A Whole Empire Walking : Refugees in Russia During World War I. Indiana University Press.
  • Gilpin, R. (DE-588)119214512, (DE-627)080012914, (DE-576)21166524X, aut. (1987). The political economy of international relations Robert Gilpin.
  • Goldgeier, J. M., & McFaul, M. (2003). Power and Purpose : U.S. Policy Toward Russia After the Cold War. Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=112200
  • H. Lieshout, R. (2016). Britain and the Arab Middle East : World War I and Its Aftermath. London: I.B. Tauris. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=1372785
  • Halliday, F. (DE-588)109995899, (DE-576)161282180. (1994). Rethinking international relations / Fred Halliday. London: Macmillan. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edswao&AN=edswao.041315367
  • Handbook of international relations, , 2013
  • History of International Relations : A Non-European Perspective. (2019). Netherlands, Europe: Open Book Publishers. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsbas&AN=edsbas.47A2B8DB
  • Hudson, M. O. (2019). Legal Foundations of International Relations. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsbas&AN=edsbas.910716C1
  • Imitation in international relations : observational learning, analogies, and foreign policy in R..., Goldsmith, B., 2005
  • International Relations Among Communists, , 1967
  • International relations of the Middle East / Louise Fawcett. (2005). Oxford [u.a.]: Oxford University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edswao&AN=edswao.108313514
  • Jackson, R. H. . (DE-588)123370760, (DE-576)293679878. (2010). Introduction to international relations : theories and approaches / Robert Jackson; Georg Sørensen. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edswao&AN=edswao.312277741
  • Jaeger, S. (2020). The Second World War in the Twenty-First-Century Museum: From Narrative, Memory, and Experience to Experientiality. De Gruyter. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110664416
  • Jill Steans, Lloyd Pettiford, Thomas Diez, & Imad El-Anis. (2010). An Introduction to International Relations Theory : Perspectives and Themes: Vol. Third edition. Routledge.
  • John Keegan. (2000). The First World War: Vol. 1st Vintage Book ed. Vintage.
  • JONES, H. (2013). As the Centenary Approaches: The Regeneration of First World War Historiography. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0018246x13000216
  • Julie Newton. (2013). Gorbachev, Mitterrand, and the Emergence of the Post-Cold War Order in Europe. Europe-Asia Studies, (2), 290. https://doi.org/10.1080/09668136.2012.759716
  • Kaufman, J. P. (2013). Introduction to International Relations : Theory and Practice. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=564222
  • Konrad H. Jarausch, Christian Ostermann, & Andreas Etges. (2017). The Cold War : Historiography, Memory, Representation. De Gruyter Oldenbourg.
  • Leonard V. Smith. (1994). Between Mutiny and Obedience : The Case of the French Fifth Infantry Division During World War I. Princeton University Press.
  • Major, P., & Mitter, R. (2004). Across the Blocs : Exploring Comparative Cold War Cultural and Social History. London: Routledge. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=115095
  • Mastny, V. (1996). The Cold War and Soviet Insecurity : The Stalin Years. New York: Oxford University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=151343
  • Oxford handbook of the international relations of Asia / edited by Saadia M. Pekkanen, John Ravenhill and Rosemary Foot. (2014). New York, NY [u.a.]: Oxford University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edswao&AN=edswao.414586344
  • Painter, D. (2006). A Partial History of the Cold War. Cold War History, 6(4), 527. https://doi.org/10.1080/14682740600979295
  • Palmadessa, A. L. (2019). Cold War: Global Impact and Lessons Learned. New York: Nova. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=2156015
  • Pejić, I. (2018). Geopolitics of Containment in the Post Cold War World. TEME: Casopis Za Društvene Nauke, 12(4), 1389–1404. https://doi.org/10.22190/TEME1804389P
  • Puchala D. J. Theory and history in international relations. – Routledge, 2013.
  • Richmond, O. P. (2008). Peace in International Relations. Routledge.
  • Ringmar, E. (2016). History of International Relations: Introduction. Sweden, Europe: Open Book Publishers. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsbas&AN=edsbas.8F28BEAB
  • Russia's Identity in International Relations : Images, Perceptions, Misperceptions, edited by Raymond Taras, Routledge, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/hselibrary-ebooks/detail.action?docID=1039305.
  • Sara Lorenzini. (2019). Global Development : A Cold War History. Princeton University Press.
  • Sarantakes, N. E., & Westad, O. A. (2019). The Cold War: A World History. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsbas&AN=edsbas.A214A659
  • Scheer, T. (2017). Denunciation and the decline of the Habsburg home front during the First World War. European Review of History, 24(2), 214–228. https://doi.org/10.1080/13507486.2016.1257577
  • Simmons, B. A., Risse-Kappen, T., & Carlsnaes, W. (2013). Handbook of International Relations. London: SAGE Publications Ltd. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=716889
  • Smetana, V., & Kramer, M. (2014). Imposing, Maintaining, and Tearing Open the Iron Curtain : The Cold War and East-Central Europe, 1945–1989. Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=670088
  • Sorenson, D. S., & Wood, P. C. (Eds.). (2005). The politics of peacekeeping in the post-cold war era.
  • Spohr, K., & Reynolds, D. (2016). Transcending the Cold War : Summits, Statecraft, and the Dissolution of Bipolarity in Europe, 1970–1990. Oxford: OUP Oxford. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=1339515
  • The globalization of world politics : an introduction to international relations / ed. by John Baylis . (2008). Oxford [u.a.]: Oxford University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edswao&AN=edswao.275739120
  • Trenin, D. V. . (DE-588)114738327, (DE-576)175880190. (2014). Russia’s breakout from the post-Cold War system [Elektronische Ressource] : the drivers of Putin’s course / Dmitri Trenin. Moscow: Carnegie Moscow Center. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edswao&AN=edswao.444960643
  • Walt, S. M. (1998). International relations: One world, many theories. Foreign Policy, (110), 29. https://doi.org/10.2307/1149275
  • WARNER, G. (2016). The Cambridge history of the Second World War. International Affairs, 92(5), 1239–1247. https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2346.12710
  • Weiner, A. (2002). Making Sense of War : The Second World War and the Fate of the Bolshevik Revolution. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=430829
  • Westad, O. A. (2017). The Cold War : A World History (Vol. First edition). New York: Basic Books. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=1512461
  • Wight, C. (2006). Agents, Structures and International Relations : Politics As Ontology. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=174462
  • Winter, J. M. (1992). Catastrophe and culture: Recent trends in the historiography of the First World War. Journal of Modern History, 64(3), 525. https://doi.org/10.1086/244514
  • Yahuda, M. B., & Shambaugh, D. L. (2008). International Relations of Asia. Lanham, Md: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=243634

Recommended Additional Bibliography

  • HILGER, A. (2019). The Global Cold War and Its Legacies. Kritika: Explorations in Russian & Eurasian History, 20(1), 208–218. https://doi.org/10.1353/kri.2019.0014
  • Levering, R. B. (2016). The Cold War : A Post-Cold War History (Vol. Third edition). Chichester, West Sussex, UK: Wiley-Blackwell. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=1127819
  • Schumpeter, innovation and growth : long-cycle dynamics in the post-WWII American manufacturing industries, Keklik, M., 2003

Authors

  • Kiseleva Daria Aleksandrovna
  • ALEKSEEV DANIIL OLEGOVICH
  • Mazhinskii Stanislav Vitalevich