White Paper/Policy Brief due April 19 (30%): This assignment is your chance to deep dive into a global politics challenge and propose a solution to the issue. White papers and policy briefs are technically different in international relations, but at the undergraduate level, they would be very similar. You may use online guidance you find for either. Both of them are fundamentally about identifying and exploring a problem and then proposing solutions to the reader. The intended reader would be a government actor or body.
White papers and policy briefs offer authoritative perspectives on or solutions to a political, economic, or social problem. They are meant to help readers understand or make decisions about an issue. They concisely inform readers about a complex socio-economic issue and present the writer’s or organization’s problem-solving philosophy. White papers are standard in policy, politics, business, and technical fields. In global politics, white papers guide decision-makers with expert opinions, recommendations, and analytical research through their overviews of an issue or problem, targeted analysis, and, often, actionable advice. They may be submitted to leaders by non-governmental organizations (NGOs), think tanks, universities, domestic government agencies, or foreign governments or bodies, and may give guidance on a range of issues—from how to reduce carbon emissions or voting corruption to ways to foster post-conflict peacebuilding processes or GDP growth. After identifying the global politics challenge you would like to help problem-solve, you need to research and draw from empirical research and case study examples to bolster your arguments in a total of 3000 words.
Your white paper/policy brief may interrogate relevant variables, comparative models of foreign policies (and lessons learned from those), clear goals and a cohesive direction, pros and cons, financial and political feasibility of actual implementation, potential pushback, and how to ensure adherence to your proposed policy. Here are examples of USAID’s white papersLinks to an external site. and policy briefsLinks to an external site. (although you do not need USAID’s fancy formatting).
Examples of topics you can cover include but are not limited to climate change, an immigration policy, a military occupation, gender equality, healthcare, food security, urbanization, child welfare, foreign aid, etc. If you are unsure about a topic, please message me to ask.
Here is an outline for the white paper/policy brief:
I. Introduction (including “Problem Statement”)
II. Background with APALinks to an external site. citations (research-heavy)
III. Proposed solution
IV. Conclusion
V. References page in APA (website links are not proper references)
Note that, unlike most academic papers, the solution (ultimately, the main argument) should appear at the end, after the information has been presented and analyzed.
*Double-space, use Times font, have Grammarly check your submission, insert page numbers throughout, indent your paragraphs, and submit in Word.
