Junior Seminar: The Politics and Policy of Crisis and Risk

Many public issues are about the risk of something bad happening—an oil spill, about of extreme heat, or a terrorist attack. When bad things do happen, like a pandemic, a disastrous wildfire or a mid-air airplane collision, they often produce a crisis that grabs headlines and demands urgent attention. This course explores how risk and crisis create a certain style of politics that can galvanize or derail policymaking and influence problem definition and policy design. The course will examine how crisis and risk are used to claim power and authority, but also how power and authority are deployed to limit our ability to respond effectively to risk and crisis. We will also investigate the strategic and institutional issues that arise in preparing for, responding to, and managing crises and risks, exploring topics such as preparedness, precaution, resilience, reliability and robustness. The course will adopt a comparative and multilevel perspective and draw on examples and research from different policy sectors.