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Observation |Interviewing
| Focus Groups | Mission Report
Assignments
Presentation
This assignment is due on 1 October
Prepare a three-minute presentation on a topic of our choice in the field of international affairs for either the Global Collaboratory or the seminar room. It is up to you whether or not to use PowerPoint slides.
Speaker's List for the Presentations:
Global Collaboratory
Petrona Nekeisha Salmon:
Restaveks: Modern Slavery of Haiti's
Children
Uuree Sangi: Mongolia
Eric Inafuku: US Security and
Foreign Policy on Sub Saharan
Africa
Ephraim Abwe Diabe: Challenges of Post-conflict Peace Building:
Lessons from the DDR Process in la Cote
D'Ivoire
Marko Markov:
How a Unified Germany Has Historically Changed
European International Relations
Tamara
Sergeevna Polyakova:
The Cyber War between Georgia
and Russia
Matthew D. Duncan: The Hostage Crisis off the Coast of Somalia
Lindsey Ada Ohmit: A Simulation of the EU
Bailey Ann Cahall: The
Presidential Election
Matt Clayton: Drug Trafficking in South Asia
Dingxiaozi Ding: Amnesty
International's Project on Refugees
Kartikh Khambhampati: The Naxalite/Maoist
Rebel Threat to India
Marcelo Carrasco Guerra:
The Surge of a New Left in
South
America
Pei Hu: Does Taiwan Have the Right to Declare Formal
Independence through the Eyes of
International Law
Hamza Safouane: European Citizenship
Matthew McGinn: The International Rescue Committee
the Food Crisis
Organizations
Kate Czarniak: Study Abroad
This assignment is due on 29 October
Using the recording and transcript of the Norwegian oil policy simulation, you would write a report about what you observed. Your report should include a description of the actors, acts, and setting. In addition, you should describe how the discussion evolved over time, with particular attention to conflicts based on differences in values. How was the issue resolved? Who were the leaders of the group? How do you know that?
Please limit the paper to four pages, double-spaced, with 12
pitch Times New Roman font.
This assignment is due on 19 November
1. Design an interview instrument that targets policy specialists or officials in order to collect information about an actual policy problem, preferably in your area of interest, that has occurred in the last three years.
2. The design should include a description of the policy problem, as well as the sampling plan.
3. The information will be utilized at a later date to construct a model of a policy situation that would enable you to build a simulation of an unanticipated event or occurrence, for example, an oil spill in the ocean or the overthrow of a government by the military in a friendly country.
4. The instrument should be developed with a 20-minute scheduled, unstructured interview in mind.
5. The instrument should begin with a brief introduction to the policy domain and a short chronology, if that would be helpful.
6. The first set of questions should focus on the antecedents to the policy problem. The questions should ask for some of the factors that led up to the problem.
7. The second set of questions should focus on how the problem developed over time, and where it might lead and how might it affect the objectives and values of the respondent's group, organization, or country.
8. The third set of questions should focus on policy alternatives for dealing with the problem area, and how each alternative will affect future developments.
9. Throughout the interview, you should probe for examples and clarifications.
10. You will use this instrument in class to conduct a practice interview. After the practice interview, your partner will give you a debriefing about the instrument. Please include the major points that were discussed in this debriefing.
Focus
Groups
The focus group sessions will be run in class on 12 November.
The written assignment is due on 3 December.
The first focus group
will be run by
the following team:
The participants in this
practice session will be the other class
members.
Recording: Download | Streaming
The second focus group will be run by the following
team:
Recording: Download | Streaming
The Third focus group
will be run by the following
team:
Recording: Download | Streaming
The fourth focus group will be run by the following
team:
Recording: Download | Streaming
The fifth focus group will be run by the following
team:
Recording: Download | Streaming
Your report, which is due on 3 December, should describe the
behavior of the focus group that you run from the point of view
of a participant observer.
Please limit the paper to ten
pages, double-spaced, with 12 pitch Times New Roman
font.
The paper should cover the following topics:
1. Objectives of the focus group.
2. Group membership and selection criteria.
3. Question development: brainstorming; phrasing of
questions;
sequencing of questions; timing
of questions; feedback; and
testing.
4. The setting of the focus group.
5. The ground rules.
6. Facilitation strategies.
7. Outcomes: description of the discussion flow,
problem
development, and group
interaction.
8. Debriefing
9. Conclusions and recommendations
Mission
Report
This assignment is due on
10 December.
Your mission report
will be a discussion and critique of the
simulation that you and your colleagues
designed in class.
It should include the following elements: 1) a description of the
process of designing
the simulation; 2) a description of your role
in the design
process (your field notes); 3) a critique of the
process, including
what you learned about the technique and
about yourself as a
researcher (e.g., what went well, what would
you do
differently, kinds of problems this technique addresses,
etc.);
4) a discussion of what you learned from participating in
the process; 5) the
relevance, if any, of the experience for your
career development; 6)
a prediction of what you think will
happen when the simulation
is run next May with special
attention to how the "surprise"
will alter the outcomes.
� 2008 G. Matthew Bonham