Blog Group 4

Playing the modified version of Risk at the end of class was a cool way to incorporate some of the theories that we learned about in class. The game mirrored some of the concepts and incidents that we talked about in class. For example, the information discrepancy between teams led some teams to ally or go to war with each other, which was reminiscent of the environment between the U.S. and Iraq before the start of the Iraq War. Additionally, the schism between the Yellow and Pink teams was very interesting. The Pink team gained the favor of a superpower (Blue) to support its revolt in order to try and suppress Blue’s rival, Yellow. However, later on, Pink and Yellow both teamed up against Blue. This reminded me of how the U.S. supported the groups that would become the Taliban and Al-Qaeda against the Soviets in the 80s and 90s, only to have them become our greatest enemies in the 2000s. The game was unrealistic in that teams were able to hold multiple concurrent wars at the same t

As we began playing risk, one of the realistic aspects of the game was the realization that the super was my team, blue. I connected this to the United States because we have a lot of resources and influence with other countries. We are also allied with many countries as well. To the world, we look like winners but even the winners can be vulnerable. They are vulnerable to people attacking them because they are so powerful. For example, we wanted power in Ukraine and the green team took advantage of that and attacked us. We put our trust in our alliances not know that people wanted to be against the blue team. Additionally, even though people wanted to go against us they still wanted to be our ally because of the resources we had. Something that I found unrealistic about the game was that there were not any uprisings from civilians of states. We spent our time going to war with other colors in the game without thinking about the casualties and people who are affected. There could be

Risk captures so many aspects of International Relations, and outlines a lot of what was discussed in class throughout the semester. On the first day of class, we discussed some definitions and aspects of relations. It was decided that relations can be boiled down to a few main points. The points being great powers interacting, war, diplomacy, trade, and organizations. Risk nails just about all of these points. Declaring war, trading with allies, having a world council, and interacting with allies all take part in our version of Risk. International relations is typically about relations between states, and Risk is based upon making relationships with allies and using this relationship to help in times of war to get to their country’s main end goal. A slight piece of anarchy could be shown in our version of Risk, but we didn’t encounter that too often. While we did have a group break off and form a schism, at the end of every round, no one really voted out their l

Upon playing the game of Risk for the first time, it could be noticed that there are some realistic and unrealistic factors of the game.  For example, with playing the game for a total of two class periods it could be demonstrated the difficulty to achieve an objective in world politics.  It was extremely troublesome to talk to other teams and try to achieve a specific goal.  One team may want an alliance to benefit themselves, however, in some instances the other team would not want an alliance since it would harm their relationship with another team.  As a result, cooperating with other teams and trying to maintain a certain objective to win the game was a struggle.  In addition, similar to world politics, one becomes self-consumed in the game and loses focus of what the others are trying to accomplish.  For example, most teams were so consumed on their own goal and did not consider what other teams were trying to complete.  In real life politics this is very common since a country

Global terror has plagued the international community in increasing frequency and tragedy for the last two decades. The rise of groups like Al-Qaeda, ISIS, Hamas, and others have left thousands dead and given rise to new fear, and an elusive enemy. These groups have used ever more brutal tactics to stage devastating attacks on civilians in both their home countries and abroad. In the early 2000s, the U.S. began a so-called “ War On Terror ” to combat the rise of such groups, only to have the even more dangerous organization of ISIS rise out of the ashes of our own operations in Iraq. These groups are hard to fight and even harder to dismantle, so what are our options in the War on Terror? I believe that the problem stems from the ostracized environment in which immigrant Middle eastern communities exist in the West.   As long as we continue to marginalize Muslim communities in the U.S. and Europe, we will continue to be fostering an environment that makes it easy for terrorist groups

          Globalization is rapidly expanding in the 21st century world. It has brought the world a faster access to technology as well as countless improvements and innovations. Globalization is known for bringing the world together, combining cultures as well as economic success and developing countries. There are many pros and cons to be debated on globalization, I will be discussing the impact that Globalization has the environment, specifically how it negatively impacts the environment and why we may want to tone back or make changes to the globalization process for the sake of the environment.           One of the common benefits of globalization is the increase of the consumption of products, which undoubtedly affects the environment. This increase of the consumption goods comes from the increased transportation that is being used in the Globalization process. One example comes with food consumption. People used to eat only locally grown food, now through Globalization, people a