CIS Programs

Program on the Global Environment

Launched in 2007, the Program on the Global Environment is directed by Mark T. Lycett and includes an undergraduate major and minor in Environmental Studies as well as a graduate and faculty research program. In addition, the PGE sponsors public education and outreach programs and works with campus environmental organization and the university Sustainability Council.

The PGE encourages research collaborations across disciplinary and divisional divides through its conferences, lecture series, and the Workshop on the Global Environment as well as through the design of the undergraduate program. With its inaugural “Social Life of Forests” conference in May 2008, PGE opened up new areas of investigation across the human and biological sciences on historical and contemporary relationships between human habitation and resource use in and around forest ecosystems. In 2009, PGE will collaborate with the Center for Latin American Studies on an international conference on Environmental Policy, Social Movements, and Science in the Brazilian Amazon.

Undergraduate International Studies Program

The undergraduate program in International Studies (IS) has grown into one of the College’s most popular majors under the direction of Professor James Hevia. The program draws on the strengths of the College faculty in a variety of disciplines and their innovative work in such areas as human rights, international relations, globalization, transnationalism, and area studies. The program, which includes study abroad, prepares students who wish to pursue academic, government, nonprofit, or business careers with an international focus, and who value the benefits of study abroad and of cross-cultural learning. The curriculum is organized around courses drawn from two thematic tracks—international political economy and transnational processes—and from area and civilization studies.

Program on Violence, Conflict, and Security

Building on the success of the Joint Threat Anticipation Center (JTAC), a five-year joint venture with Argonne National Laboratory’s Center for Complex Adaptive Agent Systems Simulation, the Center for International Studies initiated the Program on Violence, Conflict, and Security in Autumn 2008.

This new program represents both a continuation and expansion of the intellectual scope of JTAC, designed to facilitate an interdisciplinary, global perspective on issues of violence, conflict, and security. Areas of research and teaching include fundamental questions about the underlying causes of conflict and violence as well as a range of more proximate concerns such as the variable roles of religion, culture, politics, and economics.

In 2008-09, VCS faculty and graduate student research is organized around three thematic clusters:

  • Oil and Security
  • Grand Strategy
  • Dynamics of Stabilization and Destabilization

The JTAC site, including a project description and resources, has been archived at http://jtac.uchicago.edu.