Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service

Building on the precedent set last year by SFS faculty chair and professor Charles King, this spring SFS professor and student favorite David Edelstein inaugurated his own course taught simultaneously to students in Washington and Doha. The topic? An SFS favorite: the Causes of War.

SFS bi-local courses such as these allow students a greater opportunity to engage in dialogue with perspectives different from their own.

Professor Edelstein began preparing his course last year. He was able to create a thoroughly integrated classroom environment across continents, taking advantage of far more sophisticated technology available now. Known as “telepresence,” it is described by Professor Edelstein as “essentially the next generation of videoconferencing technology, showing a dramatic improvement over what was previously available”. During the Causes of War course, telepresence rooms in Washington and Doha utilized a high-speed internet connection to stream live high-definition audio and life-size video overseas, creating the effect of one unified classroom. “Whereas older video conferencing technology would make these types of connections awkward, this new technology makes the connection virtually seamless,” remarked Edelstein.

The technological aspects of Causes of War, though revolutionary in themselves, do not tell the whole story. SFS “bi-local” courses such as these allow students a greater opportunity to engage in dialogue with perspectives different from their own. This spring, students were brought together from across the United States as well as Qatar, India, Pakistan, Mauritania, and other countries across the globe. Professor Edelstein found that the unique regional perspective of his SFS-Qatar students, especially when the course focused on the causes of Middle Eastern wars, was invaluable in sparking discussion and greater understanding for the group as a whole.

“At one point, we had a very stimulating discussion about liberal democracy and whether or not its promotion is a way of preventing war. Some of the students in Doha had interesting and provocative thoughts on liberal democracy that you might not necessarily encounter as often on the DC campus,” he reflected.

Over SFS-W’s spring break, the class had a chance to meet in the more traditional sense, as the main campus students traveled to Qatar to meet their classmates in person and present collaborative long-term projects on Middle Eastern wars. “We had a terrific trip to Doha,” said Edelstein. “The rapport between the DC and the Doha students was great, as if they had been in the same classroom together all along.”