COURSE NUMBER: |
POLI 399 |
COURSE TITLE: |
Special Topics in Environmental Studies - 2013/14 Fall
- Oil Sands
Development: Interdisciplinary Explorations |
NAME OF
INSTRUCTOR: |
Dr John Hiemstra |
CREDIT WEIGHT
AND WEEKLY TIME DISTRIBUTION: |
credits 3(hrs lect 3 - hrs sem 0 - hrs lab 0) |
COURSE
DESCRIPTION: |
A course on a topic of figure of special interest to a
member of the political science faculty and offered on a non-recurring
basis.
Prerequisites: POLI 205; some topics may have more
specific prerequisites
2013/14 Fall
This course is a special topics course that examines the tar sands
developments, perhaps the largest set of energy projects in the world,
as they unfold in Alberta’s backyard. As a seminar-style course, we
explore the oil sands developments in an interdisciplinary way,
investigating various themes including historical, environmental,
political, social, economic, technological, scientific, & faith
dimensions. We examine questions such as: what is truthfully happening
in the oil sands developments? Why is this development happening now
and in this manner? What problems and paradoxes are arising in these
developments? What is ‘development’ anyways? What roles are government,
corporations, unions, and NGOs playing in the tar sands? How do these
developments fit into globalization and other current trends such as
climate change, global resource competition, global investment
patterns, third world development, environmental sustainability,
alternative energy, etc.
Same as ENVS 399 and PHES 498.
|
REQUIRED TEXTS: |
- Andrew
Nikiforuk, Tar Sands:
Dirty Oil and the Future of a Continent, Greystone Books:
2008.
- Various
materials (required reading) linked to each topic in the “Topical
Outline of the Course,” below. These readings will be identified in
advance of the relevant class and noted on our Moodle site.
- Read
a daily major newspaper—e.g. Edmonton
Journal, The Globe and Mail, National Post—or other high
quality news sources—e.g. CBC website—for regular “oil/tar sands”
stories. Why? The story is unfolding before our eyes!!
|
MARK DISTRIBUTION IN PERCENT: |
Reflective
responses |
25% |
Class
participation |
20% |
Book review |
20% |
Final Examination |
35% |
|
|
|
100% |
|
COURSE OBJECTIVES: |
- Students will participate in a ‘community of
exploration’ and develop an understanding and appreciation of
disciplinary studies, interdisciplinary learning, communal scholarship,
and integral analysis.
- Students will explore and understand the economic,
ecological, social, political and other dimensions of, and problems
arising from, the tar/oil sands developments.
- Students will understand the roles of various
beneficiary, participant, or marginalized groups in the oil/tar sands
developments, including institutions such as, corporations, unions,
governments, environmental NGOs, churches, and coalitions.
- Students will understand how different ‘visions and
ways of life,’ including Christian visions of life, influence the ways
people think and act on tar/oil sands development.
- Students will document and understand the evolution
of, and motivation for, tar/oil sands development and be able to debate
the theoretical approaches that attempt to explain the patterns of
tar/oil sands development.
- Students will understand various ways of
understanding change, how action/change steps are framed, and what
differences they might make.
- Students will develop skills in public discussion,
cultural analysis & critique, public presentation, and
preparing short essays, and larger assignments.
|
COURSE OUTLINE: |
- I. Opening orientation
- History of the oil sands development.
- Process of ‘extracting’ bitumen.
- II. Exploring facets of
oil/tar sands developments; discerning signals from observers:
- What are scientists, participants and others
telling us?
- 1. Economics facets
of the Tar/oil Sands and rising economic concerns
- Snap shot: What’s happening now?
- 2. Geological facets
– energy reserves, consumption, and warning signs
- Peak oil and the end of cheap energy.
- Natural gas, nuclear energy, and bitumen
production.
- 3. Environmental,
ecological, & biological features and warnings
- Boreal Forest and the oil/tar sands.
- Water availability, water use; and pollution.
- Carbon, GHG, and climate change impacts of
oil/tar sands.
- Upgrader Alley and agriculture.
- 4. Social, psychological and
health aspects and problems of tar/oil sands:
- Social and health impacts of development.
- 5. Aboriginal First Nations, local
communities and oil/tar sands:
- Environmental
justice and the Tar/Oil sands
- Duty
to consult, 1491, and the ‘doctrine of discovery’
- 6. Politics and the oil/tar sands:
characteristics and concerns
- Government and Tar/oil Sands Royalties.
- Federal, provincial and local government roles?
- 7. Geographical angles: national energy
policy, continentalism, and military might.
- Local, National, Continental and global faces of
tar/oil sands
- National Energy Supply & Continental
energy security.
- Pipelines, trains, fossil fuel infrastructure and
the oilsands?
- PART II: Depth level excavations
- Depth-level One: ‘excavating’ the deeper
structural architecture of the tar/oil sands
- What are the major explanations and theories for
the oilsands developments?
- What do the larger structures of our economy and
society tell us about why the oil sands developments occur as they do,
have such amazing dynamic, and drive so much else in
our culture?
- 1. The structure and dynamic of our
global economy?
- 2. Science, knowledge, technology as a
dynamic behind the tar/oil sands?
- 3. Politics, governmental structures
and the tar/oil sands?
- 4. The ‘Ecological Question’ -
Environmental Impact Assessment, cumulative impacts, and full cost
accounting?
- Depth-level Two: ‘Drilling’ Deeper Still – Why the
rush, dynamism, and drive behind our engagement with the tar/oil sands?
- Ideology & faith, distortion &
hope?
- Conclusions:
- - Making Change: What should change? How? What does
it take?
- - Action steps for government, industry, unions,
ENGOs, and churches?
- - Class presentations of your major assignment
projects (part of participation grade, in last couple of classes).
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