Why are we still waiting for diversity in IA curricula?
Woman in graduate cap watching a male professor speak on television.
As a student of international affairs, imagine you’re holding up five sticks and can put down one stick for every professor who comes from a marginalized racial or gender identity. Put a stick down for every female professor you’ve had, every professor of color you’ve had, and every queer professor you’ve had. Would you be able to put all five sticks down?
If you can, you’re in the minority of international affairs students. For the most part, it’s no secret that the field is dominated by cis-white men. Our professors assign the course readings, design the weekly lectures, and invite the guest speakers. Cis-white male professors typically assign textbooks and articles authored by their peers. The tightknit network of international affairs practitioners and academics is dominated by cis-white men.
While universities double-down on efforts to diversify their student populations, diversification of faculty is progressing at a remarkably slow pace. Maybe tenure has something to do with that, but that is not the complete picture, because hiring of new part-time and visiting professors occurs regularly. Moreover, not having diversity in the curriculum institutionalizes not having diverse faculty who are equally valued and compensated by the University. Diversifying the perspectives and theories in international affairs courses is not only about who is lecturing, but is also largely about who students are assigned to read and what types of lenses they are asked to analyze through.
The creation of a semester-long syllabus is an arduous process for any professor. By not centering diverse perspectives in required readings and class assignments, even the most well-intentioned professors who sprinkle one or two black feminist theory and/or queer theory into their syllabi fail to understand the fundamental disservice they are doing their students. Black feminist theory and queer perspectives on international affairs have existed in the periphery of the field for decades, often only mentioned as an afterthought or offered as an elective, addendum, or footnote.
If the academic field of international affairs aims to foster graduates who are global thinkers with critical analysis skills, the only way to do so is to present students - from introductory courses, to electives, to advanced seminars - with diverse perspectives that offer alternative ways of thinking about the world. Uplifting the stories, lived experiences, and scholarly work of gender-diverse and racially-diverse scholars and activists is the best way for international affairs faculty to ensure students come out of their program able to apply different lenses of analysis to their work. Thus, it is imperative that every single faculty member takes a critical look at their syllabi and considers shifting things around to make ample room for topics like feminist foreign policy, LGBTQ+ perspectives on foreign policy, intergenerational gendered trauma, critical race theory, among others.
In addition, professors need to invest time and energy into fostering brave spaces for such discourses in their classrooms. Unfortunately, we don’t yet live in a world free from harmful stereotypes and prejudicial microaggressions. However, classrooms are meant to be the brave spaces that lead to revelation and learning. That is why it is vital for international affairs programs to support faculty training programs that focus on training faculty on how to facilitate difficult dialogues and navigate complexity in the classroom. It also requires that faculty and staff are ready to turn students to the proper resources to seek healing should a harm be done in the classroom, even if unintentionally. There is plenty out there on best practices for faculty and staff, but program administrators need to meaningfully invest, financially and otherwise, in that professional development for their faculty.
It is on all of us - professor, staff member, administrator, dean, and student alike - to reduce the impact of institutional harm and willful ignorance. It is on all of us to intentionally and bravely oppose Euro-centrism in our classes and discourses. It is on all of us to meet the moment and boldly work towards creating inclusive syllabi, curriculum, classrooms, discussions, and spaces. It is on all of us to adapt to the ever-globalized world and center the voices of those who have been screaming from the sidelines with ideas that could ultimately help us solve the most complex issues in the world. It is on all of us to always strive to be better and do better by investing in our individual and collective enlightenment. If not, we will never achieve racial equity or gender parity and we will definitely never be able to address the complexities of climate change, economic turmoil, ethnic conflict, nuclear disarmament, cyber security, and other macro-problems we as international affairs scholars are tasked with unpacking and addressing.
Right now, international affairs programs are failing at their most fundamental missions to foster global citizens and informed scholars who are prepared to meet the challenges of the world and solve the most complex problems. But, the solution to that is clear. We need brave faculty, staff, and administrators to take the leap and meaningfully invest in the diversification of curriculum and syllabi. This goes beyond creating elective courses on black feminism and gender theory, but requires fundamentally infiltrating every syllabus with diverse perspectives and facilitating difficult conversations in every class that force students to consider their biases and employ various lenses of critique and analysis to their work.
If graduates of these programs are the ones who go on to work in government agencies, international NGOs, private sector companies, nonprofit organizations, and other roles in which they have decision-making power, then programs MUST ensure that graduates have the necessary skills to make informed, strategic, and bold decisions. The alternative is not only inefficiency, but the fundamental breakdown of democracy and the ultimate demise of rational thought.
All it takes is one person to start a movement, and the field of international affairs is ripe for change. Let’s be the movement starters. We, the collective student body of international affairs students, can be the change we seek.
