PS3274: Environmental Politics

Sem: AY20/21 Semester 2

Lecturer: Dr. Matthew Aaron Lepori

*all classes were conducted online due to COVID-19 restrictions

Overview: Environmental issues are something that I’ve always been interested in learning more about, and I decided to take this mod after hearing rather good reviews about it. Even though the environment is commonly seen as one of those things affecting everyone on Earth, it’s also seen as one of the most divisive and controversial political issues today. But why is this the case? This is just one of the many puzzles that this mod addresses. We explored the relationship between environmental change and political action, looking at the broad problems and solutions, and why these are so important. The first half of this mod focused on building our foundation on environmental issues, where we asked why one should even care about the environment, who is responsible for the current state of the environment and why environmentalism is politically controversial. The second half analyses the politics of environmental change and the potential solutions to our environmental problems today. We were also encouraged to think about these topics from a Singapore perspective and to ask questions pertaining to Singapore during our tutorials.

This mod has truly helped me to gain a better appreciation of the complexities and intricacies behind environmental issues and why they can be so difficult to resolve. It has also made me more familiar with current efforts to protect biodiversity and ensure Earth remains habitable for decades to come (think: the Green New Deal, which was covered in this class and actually reintroduced in the US Congress just last week!). However, I was also starkly reminded of the limitations of each of these policies and the need for a multi-layered approach to address the multitude of environmental problems that currently exist. Lectures were pre-recorded as 30-45 minute podcasts and released on a weekly basis. While this might seem really short, Dr. Lepori does not have accompanying slides for his lectures. Coupled with the fact that he covers the same amount of content as a typical 1.5-hour physical lecture, this means that you really have to pay attention to everything he says. I often find myself rewinding the podcasts just to ensure I catch the important points, taking about 1.5-2 hours to finish a lecture. That said, his lectures provide both a good synthesis and summary of the weekly readings, helping you to understand how these readings fit into the overall topic for the week, both separately and together. Readings were also quite interesting and easy to clear, providing a good complement to the lectures. For a 3K PS mod, the workload is relatively light which was a big plus to me!

Would recommend this mod for anyone who’s interested in learning more about environmental issues or how these issues interact with politics, even if one might not have any prior knowledge about the environment. Environmental issues is definitely something that affects all of us in some form and it's always good to develop a broad understanding of the debates surrounding the environment at present.

Assessment:

Discussion Questions (10%): Dr. Lepori adopts a similar format across all the 2K/3K mods he teaches so this might be quite familiar to you if you have taken his other mods before. By noon the day before each tutorial, one is expected to submit two discussion questions based on the previous two weeks’ readings. One question has to be clarificatory (i.e., what was X mean on page Y?) and the other should be a ramification question (i.e., what ramifications does X have upon Y?). Each question is marked credit/no credit and it’s quite easy to score so one just has to take this seriously.

Tutorial Participation (10%): Dr. Lepori or his TA will collate the discussion questions submitted by your tutorial group and choose a select few to discuss in your breakout rooms. Your breakout room will then present what you have discussed to the rest of the class. Pretty standard stuff here.

Take-Home Midterm (40%): This comprises four short-answer questions (250 words each). It covers content from the first half of the sem and you get about a week (typically Recess Week) to finish it. The questions are very similar to what is discussed during lectures so taking comprehensive notes is important to score well for this module. The word count is deliberately kept tight to discourage fluff and ensure your answer directly answers the question. Personally, I think that this is actually a good way to force you to think about what are the broad themes and issues worth remembering in this module, long after you forget everything else (though you might be free to disagree with me on this). Do try to include as many relevant points as possible as Dr. Lepori adopts point-based marking for his assessments (i.e. you get a mark if you have a relevant point).

Take-Home Finals (40%): Essentially the same format as the midterms, except that it covers content from the second half of the sem and is typically done during Reading Week.