Enrolments for 2020 have closed.
Creating New States
Undergraduate | MAQ-POIX3040 | 2020
Previously MAQ-POIX304
Course information for 2020 intake
View information for 2021 course intakeStrive to understand how new states are created and why they're still being formed today. Highlight examples of secessions from states. Run through the legalities involved when forming a state. Explore future possibilities for a single world state.
- Study method
- 100% online
- Assessments
- 100% online
- Entry requirements
- Prior study needed
- Duration
- 18 weeks
HECS-HELP and FEE-HELP available
Creating New States
About this subject
At the completion of this subject students will know:
- how to identify and analyse a political process when it occurs at different periods and in a different social and geographical space
- how to identify, compare and contrast the salient aspects of a single political process taking place in these different temporal and spatial locations
- how to use social science theories in the performance of above two tasks
- how to use social science theories in an attempt to identify the causal factors which may explain such political processes
- how to use normative (political and ethical) theories to evaluate/assess particular cases of political activity and their outcomes.
- Creating new states
- The State: the centralization of political power on a bounded territory
- The Nation: how to mobillize people to demand and obey a state of their own
- The principle of Self-determination and decolonization
- Ways of creating new states out of old ones
- Case studies: dissolution of states by sequential secessions
- Peaceful and violent secessions from states
- How to explain secessions
- Justifying secesssions and recognizing new states
- Unification
- Towards the unification of the world
This subject was previously known as PLT310 States and Nations, POIX304 Creating New States.
Since 1914 new states have been continuously created and their existence justified on the basis of the principle of national self-determination: in the last hundred years, the number of independent states has grown from around 52 to more than 195. In most cases, the new states were allegedly ‘created by’ or ‘assigned to’ individual nations. What are those powerful agents, ‘nations,’ that need and create states of their own? How are new states created today? How can we justify the creation of new independent states today, when there are so few if any dependent states - colonies - left? The subject aims to answer these questions by examining both the processes through which territories and populations withdraw - secede – from existing states and the legal and normative framework within which these processes currently take place. In addition, recent attempts at state integration or unification, such as the European Union, and a few plans for a single world state will be briefly discussed.
- Review Essay (15%)
- Research Essay (40%)
- Take home examination (35%)
- Participation in Weekly Discus (10%)
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Entry requirements
Equivalent subjects
You should not enrol in this subject if you have successfully completed any of the following subject(s) because they are considered academically equivalent:
MAQ-PLT310 (Not currently available)
MAQ-POIX304-Creating New States (no longer available)
Others
Students should have studied some politics at 200 level prior to undertaking this subject.
Additional requirements
- Other requirements -
Students who have an Academic Standing of Suspension or Exclusion under Macquarie University's Academic Progression Policy are not permitted to enrol in OUA units offered by Macquarie University. Students with an Academic Standing of Suspension or Exclusion who have enrolled in units through OUA will be withdrawn.
Study load
- 0.125 EFTSL
- This is in the range of 10 to 12 hours of study each week.
Equivalent full time study load (EFTSL) is one way to calculate your study load. One (1.0) EFTSL is equivalent to a full-time study load for one year.
Find out more information on Commonwealth Loans to understand what this means to your eligibility for financial support.
What to study next?
Once you’ve completed this subject it can be credited towards one of the following courses
Undergraduate
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