Department of International Relations - Chair's Welcome

To say we live in troubled times is to state the obvious but the study of international relations gives us room for hope. Our discipline seeks to understand international events, to make sense of actions which at first glance seem to have no sense and then to suggest ways of answering questions and resolving problems.
Terrorism, climate change, pandemics and interethnic wars are the pathologies of IR; today’s routine includes the expansion of the European Union and which direction it will take after this year’s referendums in France and the Netherlands, cooperation and reconstruction in the Mediterranean and the Balkans, the give and take of the transatlantic relationship and the role of the Vatican in international politics.

This is what IR means today and to study and teach it in Rome today is a pleasure and privilege for us the faculty and a fascinating satisfaction for students at AUR who are themselves a microcosm of international relations.

Welcome to our site.

James Walston
Department Chair