This module is inactive in the selected year. The information shown below is for the academic year that the module was last running in, prior to the year selected.

2016/17 Taught Postgraduate Module Catalogue

HIST5855M Guns and Global Security

30 creditsClass Size: 10

Module manager: Professor Simon Ball
Email: s.j.ball@leeds.ac.uk

Taught: Semester 2 (Jan to Jun) View Timetable

Year running 2016/17

This module is not approved as an Elective

Module summary

The impact of SALW on global security has been a crucial and controversial issue since the emergence of the modern small arms industry at the end of the nineteenth century. The international politics of SALW have led to the emergence of an international security architecture stretching from the 1890 Brussels Treaty through to the current UN Arms Trade Treaty of 2013 and beyond. The nature of warfare has also evolved, with small arms and light weapons playing a key role in many modes of armed conflict. This course investigates international business, the role of states in the international system, international organisations and conventions, and the understanding and practice of war.

Objectives

To engage students in a significant issue for modern and contemporary International History, International Politics and International Business; to interrogate both secondary literature and primary sources in English.

Learning outcomes
On completing this module students will:
a) have a deeper understanding of the maturation of and subsequent developments in the global small arms business;
b) have a deeper understanding of the maturation of and subsequent developments in the international architecture of Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW) control;
c) have a deeper understanding of the impact of SALW on global security;
d) be able to illustrate these developments with concrete historical and contemporary examples, and therefore;
e) be able to provide the historical ‘long view’ on a major issue in contemporary international politics;
f) be able to demonstrate a firm grasp of the historical, conceptual, and political controversies surrounding this topic.

Syllabus

1. The Analytical Framework: The Ten Propositions of SALW
Conflict & Global Security
2. Do developments in small arms produce major changes in tactics and types of warfare?
3. Does small arms proliferation in technologically backward areas give indigenous groups the power to challenge major powers?
4. Do small arms create instability in under-developed areas, seriously affecting the life chances of indigenous populations?
5. Are small arms of most use to terrorist or revolutionary groups; can they be used to create the spark to conflagration, the ‘Gavrilo Princip’ model?
6. Do small arms enable criminal, or immoral, activity such as the slave or drugs trades?
The Arms Trade and Global Security
7. Does a mixed economy of private and state R&D and manufacture yield the most efficient means of maintaining small arms industries for national defence?
8. Do private manufacturers deliberately retard the growth of state arsenals to ensure that they reap the profit from crisis manufacture of arms?
9. Do private manufacturers of, and traders in, weapons – the 'Merchants of Death' – deliberately stoke up international instability for their own pecuniary gain? Can the causes of specific conflicts be traced to their actions?
States and Global Security
10. Is rapid rearmament by undemocratic states a good predictor of forthcoming aggression?
11. Can Western states - often the most culpable in selling arms - be trusted to limit the trade in small arms?

Teaching methods

Delivery type	Number	Length hours	Student hours
Seminar	11	2.00	22.00
Private study hours			278.00
Total Contact hours			22.00
Total hours (100hr per 10 credits)			300.00

Private study

Students are expected to prepare thoroughly for each seminar. This will include:
..the reading and analysis of set materials
..broader, independent reading
..engagement with the work of other seminar participants
The module includes two summative pieces of assessment, and one informal exercise. For these, students will:
…carry out independent research
…develop appropriate skills of criticism, analysis, referencing, and articulation

Opportunities for Formative Feedback

Student progress will be monitored formally through presentations in the course of the module as well as informally through weekly responses in each seminar.

Methods of assessment

Coursework

Assessment type	Notes	% of formal assessment
Essay	1 x 2,000-word essay due by 12 noon Monday of teaching week 10	33.00
Essay	1 x 4,000-word essay due by 12 noon Monday of exam week 2	67.00
Total percentage (Assessment Coursework)		100.00

Normally resits will be assessed by the same methodology as the first attempt, unless otherwise stated

Reading list

The reading list is available from the Library website

Last updated: 20/04/2015

Disclaimer

Browse Other Catalogues

• Undergraduate module catalogue
• Taught Postgraduate module catalogue
• Undergraduate programme catalogue
• Taught Postgraduate programme catalogue

Errors, omissions, failed links etc should be notified to the Catalogue Team.PROD