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The Game of Risk

  Madison Kjeldgaard  The game of Risk was a very valuable addition to our class. I never thought a board game that I played hundreds of times with my family would teach me so much global politics. When I played the game the goal was total domination and while this modified game incorderated a lot of the same aspects it was also entirely different. I was on the black team and our goal was to maintain peace and try to make twelve alliances. Why this seems like an impossible task considering the nature of the game it was actually quite a common victor.  When my group first got this assignment I thought it was going to be impossible because typically people like to keep things interesting and I thought that game would trend towards war. And while in a lot of aspects it did, a large number of alliances were made.  The fact that each group had their own objective made the game extra interesting. In the real world countries have their own agenda and sometimes it might be clear but a lot of t
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Are Human Rights Universal?

In the United States, the common person in the country has the privilege and access to basic human rights. As a result of this uniform access throughout the nation as a whole, as well as most of the other democratic nations in the world, the push to change how other countries treat people is apparent. For instance, when the people in a nation such as the United States see that the people of a culturally different nation are given less access to human rights, their inherent urge to call out the other nation to initiate change sometimes is misplaced because of their lack of understanding for the overlying culture of that nation. For instance, in nations such as Saudi Arabia, women do not have the same access to human rights as men mostly due to the fact that many of these countries all practice Islam or other faiths that justify giving women less rights than males. Thus, as Nhiana Lee states, governments such as the one in Saudi Arabia, “resist international norms they perceive as contra
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Sports and Politics can no longer be separated

  Sports and Politics can no longer be separated   In the book  How Soccer explains the world , written by Franklin Foer, we can recognize connections between our globalized world, politics, and international sports. It is a subject which is today very present in our society and our media. One of the most current events was the disappearance of the Chinese Tennis player Peng Shuai followed by a questionable and orchestrated emergence. The Women's Tennis Association reacted and canceled all tennis tournaments in China for next year. It is the right decision because the incident shows that one cannot separate sports and politics anymore.     Disputes and intermingling between politics and sports are evident in many recent events. Sports becomes more and more political. Of course, politics has also shaped the sport in the past. One event that immediately comes to mind is the USA boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics. The USA reacted with this spectacular symbolic policy to Russia's
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The Dangers of Nuclear Weapons

  Suzanne Hannigan Professor Mark Shirk International Politics 6 December 2021 Nuclear weapons have caused incredible and irreversible destruction. This type of war and destruction was not possible in the past, but now nuclear weapons play a daily threat to international peace. Would the world be better off without nuclear weapons? I believe the answer to this question is yes. A world without nuclear weapons would eliminate the threat of mass destruction and significantly lower war casualties. The most important aspect of international peace should ultimately be the protection and preservation of people's lives. A weapon capable of such immeasurable destruction could never be considered desirable in any capacity. It simply is not worth the lives it causes.  The elimination of nuclear weapons would also ensure that mutually assured destruction could never come to be. A nuclear war has the potential to truly wipe out the entire human race. This fact alone should persuade people t
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Revisiting Kenneth Waltz's Theories about Iranian Nuclearization in Today's Climate- Drew Holm 12/2/21

  In a 2012 edition of Foreign Affairs political scientist Kenneth N. Waltz argued that the Middle East would become more peaceful if Iran obtained a nuclear weapon because it would fill the power balance created by a nuclear armed Israel. While in 2012, there was risk of Iranian nuclearization, in 2021, we are closer than ever to testing Waltz’s theory. Ever since the United States pulled out the JCPOA in 2018 Iran has renewed its attempts to build a nuclear weapon. As of November 30, 2021 Iran has advanced their nuclear program further than ever before. According to the Associated Press, “Iran now enriches small amounts of uranium up to 60% purity — a short step from weapons-grade levels of 90%” (Karimi 2021). This progress puts Iran about 18-24 months away from producing a nuclear bomb (Knell 2021). The United States and the other signatories of the JCPOA started meeting with Iran in Vienna on Monday in attempts to reenter the nuclear deal, and stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear bom
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Terror from Within

In the United States, especially following 9/11, there has been widespread awareness and identification of threats of malicious nature against the nation. When thinking about such threats and protecting the nation, the debate as to whether all of these things can be labelled as terrorism has arisen. To be frank, questioning whether an American citizen attacking a place in the US should be considered terrorism or not is a valid question of the meaning of the word and concept itself. For me, terrorism can come from within a country, and has elements of premeditation, motive, and organization. This last statement definitely comes to head with a lot of opposition, and many have contrary ideas of the characteristics of terrorism. However,it is important to consider the notion that terrorism is a label that is often utilized on to chastise the malicious party politically when the receiving party sees fit. From this, it is important to consider a polarizing event of this nature such as the Ja
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Universal Freedoms and whether it's realistic or not

  Madison Kjeldgaard  There has been ongoing debate about whether or not there should be certain human rights that should be maintained world wide. There are many factors that go into what is classified as a human right and what it means to be “free”. Culture plays a large role in this definition. This then begs the question how do you create universal rights if it doesn’t align with the values of all. Each country and leader hold certain cultural values that they chose to implement into their regime. This includes rules regarding marriage, freedom of speech and expression as well as religion. It's important to establish universal rights like not to be persecuted based on gender, religion, and sexual orientation but not every country agrees with that. As of right now it's up to each individual country to decide what is “freedom”. A lot of people use a western lens to evaluate what freedom means. For some laws currently implemented by others seem unfair, it is justified by their
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