Connecting the Global and the Local: the Agentic Experience of Diplomatic Simulations

Abstract

This panel, including four undergraduate students and one panel Moderator from the University of the District of Columbia Political Science Program, is intended to provide a venue for UDC students who participate in international diplomatic simulations in Washington, D.C. to relate how these simulations have allowed them to forge conceptual connections between structures and practices at the global level and life opportunities and community well-being at the local level. Students will discuss 1) their experience in training for debate and the use of diplomatic protocol, 2) how their own initiatives in researching comparative and regional politics, economics and culture have broadened their comparative perspective on both their own identities and their personal experience, 3) how these experiences have allowed them to better understand how power relationships at a global level determine possibilities and outcomes at the local level, and 4) how the simulation preparation and participation clarified their relation to state, government, nation and global order. Gaining these perspectives through high impact learning experiences, and drawing insights from comparative and global politics research, journal entries, position papers, draft resolutions and reflection essays, these students will detail how their experiences in preparing for, and participating in, diplomatic simulations allowed them to better understand issues of power, and social justice at multiple, linked levels of analysis, and the impact of these global forces upon themselves, their loved ones and their communities. Additionally, training and participation in these simulations helped students develop, through hands-on participatory experience, skills in public speaking, debate and negotiation, formal oral and written diplomatic communication, and acquisition of symbolic capital for their further professional development. Students will conclude their presentation with a summary of their experience, endorsement of elements that were especially valuable for them, and critique and suggestions for further development of these exercises in an ongoing process of a global studies curriculum building designed to empower students as agents for social justice in a globalized world. Panelists: Cheukying Lam, University of the District of Columbia, Model Arab League Dante Pope, University of the District of Columbia, Model Arab League Cheick O. Diakite, University of the District of Columbia, Model Organization of American States Naji Mujahid, University of the District of Columbia, Model Organization of American States