Block IV: Grand Strategy and Security Policy
11-29 June 2012 (15 days of instruction without weekends)
ETH Zurich, and various corporate and government sites in Washington D.C.
The first week of the Grand Strategy and Security Policy course is held at ETH Zurich and focuses on European strategic dimensions. The second and third weeks are conducted in Washington, D.C. (US) in cooperation with lecturers from the National Defense University, the National Intelligence University, the Pentagon and numerous thinks tanks. This course familiarizes participants with the design, development, and application of major grand strategy tools in the economic, diplomatic, military, and information spheres.
Learning Objectives
The main goals are to improve the expertise and knowledge of grand strategy tools and policy environment, to improve the awareness of defense needs and priorities by key global actors, and to strengthen the ability to identify and manage strategic change in science, technology, foreign, and defense policy.
Learning Content
The course block is built around three fields: The European strategic dimensions include European integration and enlargement, the European Unions’ political system, European Security and Defense Policy, Germany and France in European and global security, and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. The second covers the changing nature of defense and defense transformation, grand strategy and national security strategy frameworks, information, military, economic, and diplomatic strategy tools, and US foreign and defense policy. Themes around intelligence are important as well: national strategic warning systems, intelligence reform, national counterterrorism structures, and homeland defense capabilities and counter-insurgency capabilities. Finally, a third field deals with specific country cases: policy options for the Middle East, the rise of China and India, US-Russian and US-European Union relations.