By examining how the international community addresses global environmental challenges, this course will take students to explore the multi-disciplinary environmental studies in both theory and practice. Through discovery-enriched approaches, learning activities will provide students with different chances to analyze various efforts by international stakeholders (state, NGO, industry, civil society, etc) to tackle severe environmental challenges. Students will develop case profiles that link theory with empirical studies and present their own understandings in class discussion both individually and as a group. They will also learn how to analyze relationship between economic growth, international trade, transition in life styles, energy shortage, environmental degradation, institutional transition, and social development.

Students will learn how globalization of production and trade have affected local, regional, and global environmental conditions; how globalization of science and mass media have affected discussions, sharing, and contestation of claims and proposals about environmental impacts; and how international forums and negotiations have affected laws, practices, and movements in particular countries.  Students will also learn to apply this knowledge in assessing policies and innovations proposed by local governments, NGOs, business firms, and international organizations in regard to climate change and its consequences, energy supply issues and energy crisis, and ocean-related issues such as overfishing and conflict over resources in areas such as the South China Sea.