CIVICA ESR
COURSE CATALOGUE

Do you believe stress is an inevitable part of doing a PhD? With multiple deadlines, performance pressure, escalating tuition fees, and an uncertain job market, it is no wonder that students are reportedly experiencing higher levels of stress and anxiety. This workshop will examine how sustained periods of stress actually impact the mind and body. We will also consider how specific thought patterns contribute to this and explore which tools you can incorporate into your daily routine to help reduce stress.
Entry requirements: N/A

Seminar offered by Dondena Research Center (Spring 2025 seminar series) -----January 27th 2025 12:45-2:00pm (UTC+1) ------ CIVICA ESR can attend ONLINE only. Zoom meetings link will be available upon registration. ------ SEMINAR DESCRIPTION: We analyze how overlap in job requirements and labor market conditions affect recruiters' and job seekers' search across occupational boundaries. We leverage unique click data from a job and recruitment platform linked to Swiss unemployment register records. We develop a novel measure of occupational similarity that quantifies the overlap in job requirements in vacancy postings between and within occupations. Overlap strongly determines job seekers' clicks on jobs in other occupations and recruiters' contacts of candidates from other occupations. However, job seekers' last occupation is also important. Job seekers and recruiters are substantially more likely to focus on jobs or candidates in the same occupation than in other occupations with the same overlap. Finally, the importance of the last occupation varies with scarcity. If tightness in an occupation increases, job seekers are less likely to consider switching occupation while recruiters are more inclined to contact candidates from other occupations, particularly those from similar, lower-paying occupations. A key novelty of these analyses is to demonstrate recruiters' important role in moderating job seekers' ability to change occupations. ----- BIO: Rafael Lalive holds a position as a professor in economics at University of Lausanne since September 2006. His main research interests are twofold. On one hand, he works on the economic effects of reforms to public policy. Specifically, his research has focused on the effectiveness of active labor market programs in helping job seekers find jobs, on the role of financial incentives in unemployment insurance, on the effects of parental leave policies on fertility and return to work of mother of newborn children, on policies for disabled individuals and on the effects of environmental policies. He is a fellow of the Institute for the Study of Labor in Bonn (IZA) and an affiliate of CEPR and IFAU.
Teachers:

• Rafael Lalive ()

No matter how much we accomplish in our careers, many of us have an inner critic that constantly questions our abilities and our worth. Ironically, the voice of the inner critic tends to get louder the more that we achieve. This workshop will teach you strategies for minimizing the volume of your inner critic and enable you to move towards greater self-confidence.

We explore the broad principles underlying academic writing – what makes academic writing distinctive, how to situate your argument within a broader literature, and how to structure a coherent argument. In this 90-minute session, the trainer will walk you through the five steps to writing a killer introduction and how to think about - and write - literature reviews.

The course is addressed to doctoral students interested to gain introductory knowledge in foresight theory, methods and practice. In order to successfully cope with accelerated change, students need to understand contemporary and future global and regional challenges, anticipate future developments and their implications and impacts globally and regionally, and proactively prepare for them. The course aims to offer basic professional training and studying in the field of futures research with a focus on social sciences in general and international politics in particular. The course is structured on three inter-related sections. The first section provides an overview of the evolution of Futures Studies as a discipline and the main concepts with which it operates, pinpointing the differences between them, as well as the interplay between International Relations and Futures Studies in the complexity context. The second section offers a summary of some of the methods and models used in Futures Studies. The third section is more practical oriented, exemplifying with international politics case studies as well as the students’ own individual written projects some of the theoretical and methodological knowledge gained so far. Introduction to Futures Studies • Futures Studies at a glance: Forecasting, Foresight, and Anticipation • Key concepts in Futures Studies: drivers of change; trends and megatrends; non-linearity, uncertainty; weak signals; wicked problems; black swans; wild cards, futures literacy; anticipatory governance • The history and status of futures research: evolution and institutionalization – classic works, textbooks, think tanks, higher education programs, scientific journals, and professional associations • The complexity analytical framework: The interplay between International Relations and Futures Studies in the context of complexity • Doing foresight in institutional settings: The UN, UNDP, EU, NATO, and The Millennium Project Futures Research Methodologies • Epistemology and types of futures studies; quantitative, qualitative, normative, and exploratory methods; pluralist approaches; the six pillars conceptual framework • Methods of classifying, analyzing, and evaluating trends and megatrends and their impacts: the STEEP (Social, Technological, Economic, Environmental, and Political) and DEGEST (Demographics, Economics, Governance, Environment, Society, and Technology) methods • Futures research methods: Environmental Scanning; Scenario Planning/Scenario Building; Futures Wheel; Trends Impact Analysis; Futures Polygon; Causal Layered Analysis • Modelling: The International Futures forecasting system Regional and Global Futures • Anticipation case study: The partial failure of the anticipation of the fall of communism and Soviet-type societies in Central and Eastern Europe and of the end of the Cold War • The megatrend in the distribution of power from the West to the East and from the Global North to the Global South and its impact on the future of world order • International politics futures case study: US-China relationship scenarios /////// Schedule: Thursdays 17.00-19.00 EET (EEST)/16:00-18.00 CET (CEST)
Teachers:

• Pop Adrian (National University of Political Studies and Public Administration)

4-hour workshop. Time: 9 am to 1 pm. This workshop examines how to foster engagement and participation in online teaching sessions. When teaching online, you are competing for the participants’ attention with potential distractions. Compared with classroom teaching, there are more situational factors out of your control. We will look at the aspects that you as a teacher need to consider in order to make the most of your online classes. After this workshop, you are better aware of the psychological/emotional side of online interaction, and how to make it support your teaching.
Teachers:

• Carol Kiriakos (European University Institute)

The law impacts technology. Technology impacts the law. Beyond these basic truths, the interaction between law and technology is all uncertain. Some voices pretend that the law limits innovation that stems from technological change. Others believe the exact contrary. The 2023 kerfuffle over the call to temporarily ban research on generative Artificial Intelligence (“AI”) systems best exemplify the issue. Perhaps, both views are true. But can they be true at the same time, and in relation to the same laws and technologies? In what circumstances does one view dominate the other? Do other regularities govern the relationship between law and technology? Can they be seen in patterns or trends? And do these deep structural relations hold true across areas of the legal system, and across technologies? This course’s core aim is to supply a framework to address these questions. Today, we do not have the beginning of a good answer to predict how law and technology work together. Our limited state of knowledge is unfortunate. Technology is key to human flourishing. And the law is a necessary institution of any human society. Neither of them is about to disappear anytime soon. Absent a systematic understanding of the ways in which law and technology interact, incomplete approaches proliferate in the legal literature. Some works regrouped under the umbrella term law and tech (“law & tech”) tend to approach the issue holistically. But that scholarship focuses predominantly on the legal problems raised by technology (Tranter, 2011). And law & tech’s methods are not entirely satisfactory, in particular, because they predominantly default to existing law’s traditional interests in line with the culture of precedent, and understandably decline on selecting new values which is what policy and lawmakers must do all the time. Outside of that field, the relationship between law & technology is treated on a siloed basis. For example, the emerging legal scholarship on AI pays only marginal interest to prior ethical discussions in relation to human cloning, DNA sequencing, or gene editing. The “compartmentalization” of legal research (Bernstein, 2007) is clearly a problem, given the largely “combinatorial” nature of technology (Arthur, 2011). Last, most of the law and technology scholarship focuses on digital, leaving other important technological fields like bio chemistry and others subject to substantial legal uncertainty. Overall, very few clear and actionable takeaways about the relations between law and technology emerge from the literature. This course represents an attempt to overcome this state of affairs. It is based on four key propositions: one, there are deep structural relations between law & technology; two, the deep structural relations between law and technology can be studied and described; three, a bargain between law’s demands for ethics, and technology’s demand for efficiency structures legal and technological outcomes, and many deep factors like technological literacy or the timing of policymaking affect the bargain; four, some general lessons can be derived from an empirical study of law and technology’s relations.
Teachers:

• Nicolas Petit (European University Institute)

This course explores the fundamental principles and practical techniques of effective science communication. PhD Students will develop the skills necessary to convey complex scientific ideas to diverse audiences, fostering a deeper understanding of science in society. Students will learn to communicate scientific concepts ethically and engagingly through theoretical discussions, practical exercises, case studies, and real-world projects. Topics include identifying and debunking science disinformation, analyzing anti-science sentiments, science writing, science communication case studies, and ethical considerations in science communication. Course structure: 1. Introduction to Science Communication: definition and importance of science communication; historical perspective and evolution of science communication. 2. Understanding anti-science sentiments: main determinants and milestones 3. Accuracy, bias, and the responsible use of data in science communication 4. Debunking misinformation and pseudoscience in the post-truth era 5. Ethical implications of science communication in diverse cultural contexts 6. Case studies of successful and unsuccessful science communication efforts 7. Guest lectures from science communicators and professionals /////// Schedule: February 20, March 6, March 20, April 3, April 17, May 8; 4pm-8pm, CET time (5pm-9pm Romanian time)
Teachers:

• Vladu Loredana (National University of Political Studies and Public Administration)

Are you often distracted by your devices? Do you find yourself procrastinating by checking email or social media when you are meant to be working on your PhD? PhD students now face an unprecedented challenge. Pursuing a PhD requires boundless concentration, yet the exponential increase in device use has created an atmosphere of endemic distraction. During this session we will explore the consequences of digital dependency on PhD productivity and wellbeing more generally. Participants will reflect on how to better manage their time spent on devices and explore strategies for cultivating focus amid digital distraction.

Public speaking can be a daunting experience in general, but even more so in an academic setting. Whether it’s sharing your research findings, delivering job talks or teaching a class, doctoral students are frequently required to be in front of an audience. For those who suffer from presentation anxiety, the experience can be uncomfortable and even debilitating. This workshop will explore some of the common causes and symptoms of presentation anxiety. Students will come away from the workshop with a roadmap for delivering academic presentations with greater confidence.

We all know that we learn in different ways. But what are the consequences of this for our teaching? Do we really take this into consideration when planning our courses? Maybe we plan our courses according to our own preferences for learning? During this session, we will first look at different preferences for learning, including your own preferences. We will then apply this on your teaching, and you will have the opportunity to review this, and see how you perhaps could change it? Finally, you will learn about ideas that other participants have about how they could change their teaching. After this session you are expected to be able to: - Recognize the diversity of ways of learning. - Analyze your own teaching in relation to different preferences for learning. - Assess and adjust your own teaching to various contexts.
Teachers:

• Pär Mårtensson (Stockholm School of Economics)

Do you measure your PhD progress in relation to your peers? Do you find yourself constantly comparing yourself to others? In this workshop we will explore the instinct to compare ourselves to others within academia. Although the urge to compare may be understandable, the impact is rarely positive. Constant comparison not only harms our self-esteem, it also produces a skewed sense of our PhD progress. This session will consider the uniqueness of each PhD project and the futility of comparison. We will then explore ways to measure PhD progress beyond comparison.

Second in a two-part sequence providing a systematic approach to teaching fundamentals, focusing on course design and assessments. Participants must previously take Foundations or contact elkanacenter@ceu.edu for exemption. “Learning by Design” is a semester-long, intermediate-level course focused on how students learn and how instructors can facilitate student learning. Building on Foundations of Teaching in Higher Education (which is a prerequisite), it shifts the focus even more firmly from the teacher to the student. In their roles as designer, facilitator (and assessor) of learning, course participants explore how they can guide students in their learning and how to make that learning longer lasting and more significant. During our sessions we will unpack assumptions that surround student learning, delve into theories of how students learn, and explore corresponding principles and approaches to teaching that seek to align learning, teaching, and asessment. We will discuss how to better understand your students, recognize several implications of student diversity for student learning, and explore how to support different types of learners and different types of learning. We will explore, at some length, how to assess student learning, including assessment design, grading, and feedback. Throughout all of this, we will constantly reflect on our own growth as scholars in the process of becoming facilitators of learning.
Teachers:

• Tamara Kamatovic (Central European University)
• Mátyás Szabó (Central European University)

The cross-disciplinary field of “infrastructure studies” has recently captured the imagination of legal scholars interested in global and planetary ordering, technology regulation, securitization, and other topics. But what does it mean to “think infrastructurally”? This seminar discusses ways of engaging productively with insights from other disciplines that have studied infrastructures across space and time, in particular in the field of science and technology studies (STS): How do infrastructures differ from systems, networks, or platforms? How are infrastructures regulated – and how could they be regulated differently? Which infrastructures underpin regulation – and can infrastructure itself be understood as a form of regulation? Thinking infrastructurally can open-up pathways for analytical, critical, and normative inquiries from law and policy perspectives. The seminar will be attuned to researchers’ own interests and projects (facilitated through short presentations). Attendance and active participation required. Assignments include response papers and a short case study presentation of an infrastructure of relevance to the researchers’ own projects.
Teachers:

• Thomas Streinz (European University Institute)

Law and economics (L&E) is a scholarly approach that provides an economic perspective on legal institutions and the law. L&E utilizes formal and empirical economic analysis to understand the law. If the results of such economic analyses show that the explanatory power of economic theories is lacking, L&E also engages in the reconsideration of economic theories themselves. The course aims to introduce L&E as a methodological approach while being mindful of its normative assumptions and implications. It will first discuss the historical development and contemporary significance of L&E. The course will then explore several substantive policy areas: contract law, liability, antitrust, economic regulation, environmental law, behavioral law and economics, and technology. Guest lecturers will be invited to contribute to the course. Participants commit to the following: Prior reading of 2 to 4 scholarly papers or cases before each session. The papers will be discussed as the course progresses.
Teachers:

• Nicolas Petit (European University Institute)