Course finder

Semester 1

Technology, Politics and Government (PLIT10133)

Subject

Politics

College

CAHSS

Credits

20

Normal Year Taken

3

Delivery Session Year

2023/2024

Pre-requisites

Visiting students must have completed 4 Politics courses at grade B or above. We will only consider University/College level courses, and we cannot consider interdisciplinary courses or courses without sufficient Politics/Government/International Relations focus. **Please see Additional Restrictions below**

Course Summary

This course examines how technology is and can be used both within the policy process and in political communication and more widely in political messaging, for example we will investigate how social media was used in the 2016 UK-EU referendum. It offers an overview of the impact of the revolution in data analytics and the likely impact emerging technologies will have.

Course Description

In this course we will explore the ways in which policy making has become more technologically functional and we will investigate the likely direction of innovation and future development. The processes of data capture, storage, linking and analysis in the era of 'big data' will be investigated. We will investigate how social media has been used as a communication tool in both political messaging and campaigning and will discuss the possible impact this has had. We will also look at how political messaging is used by actors such activists and foreign governments and ask how this might impact on policy developments. We will consider how emerging technologies in artificial intelligence, language processing and data analysis can be used and the opportunities and limitations presented by these developments. We will identify areas where there has been technological transformation of policy and access to government services. We will look at case studies on how technology is, and will be, used in the delivery of public services. We will address the issue of public trust in the use of technology and access to our personal data. To this ends we will evaluate and debate data ethics and how this is applicable to policy-makers and to those studying the policy process.

Assessment Information

Written Exam 0%, Coursework 90%, Practical Exam 10%

Additional Restrictions

Unless you are nominated on a Politics exchange agreement, visiting students are only permitted to enrol in one Politics course each, per semester, before the start of the relevant semester’s welcome period – and spaces on each course are limited so cannot be guaranteed for any student. Enrolment in a second Politics course will depend on whether there are still spaces available in the September Welcome Period, and cannot be guaranteed. It is NOT appropriate for students to contact staff within this subject area to ask for an exception to be made; all enquiries to enrol in these courses must be made through the CAHSS Visiting Student Office. This is due to the limited number of spaces available in this very popular subject area.

view the timetable and further details for this course