SOTTILOTTA Cecilia - (Geo)Political Risk Analysis from a European Perspective (25h)
Political risk analysis can be described as a practice-driven, forward-looking set of activities carried out on a daily basis by corporate and governmental actors to provide decision-makers with insights into issues that fall outside the scope of conventional business risk, since they belong to the domain of socio-political events. In recent years, ‘geopolitical risk’ has become a buzzword in its own right: the course opens by explaining how and why this happened, and by clarifying the key conceptual differences between political and geopolitical risk. It then outlines the main methodological and epistemological challenges raised by uncertainty and risk in a fast-changing, globalised environment, before turning to key issues in international political and economic relations, with particular attention to the role played by the European Union in international affairs. Topics covered include the analysis of the most widely used techniques in economic and political forecasting (e.g. statistical extrapolation, game theoretical approaches, Delphi techniques, prediction markets, expert judgment, scenario-building), as well as the role of the digital revolution both as a catalyser for new ‘cyber’ risks and as a generator of new tools for the collection and analysis of intelligence (e.g. big data and large language model/artificial intelligence). Students are encouraged to engage in critical reasoning using theory applied to a plethora of case studies on unexpected, highly disruptive political and economic developments ‒ such as the global financial crises, Brexit, the Covid-19 pandemic, or the invasion of Ukraine ‒ which engendered different risk calculations and policy responses by the EU and its member states. During the course, students will take part in an in-class exercise on scenario planning from a European perspective. The course will enable students with a background in EU Studies, International Relations or similar to gain conceptual and practical skills that enable them to pursue a career in political risk consulting in the public as well as the private sector.
Professor: Cecilia E. SOTTILOTTA