PPGA 591C Lind Initiative Seminar
WHAT: A 3-credit course
WHEN: Thursdays, 3:30 – 5:30 PM, Winter Term 2, January – April, 2026
WHO CAN APPLY: This is a competitive entry graduate course for UBC students from any faculty. Graduate students and upper-year undergraduates are encouraged to apply.
INSTRUCTOR: Gregor Sharp, Academic Director, Lind Initiative, School of Public Policy and Global Affairs
APPLICATION DEADLINE: September 30th, 2025.
Applications will be reviewed and accepted on a rolling basis in order to help applicants plan their Term 2 schedules accordingly.
Course Title: America First, America Alone? Rethinking Global Leadership
This course takes up the central question animating the 2026 Lind Initiative: what happens when the United States steps back from the world it helped build? Under the banner of “America First,” U.S. foreign policy has turned inward, alliances are fraying, and institutions that once upheld global order are in retreat. Into this vacuum, rival powers such as China and Russia are advancing their own visions of leadership – raising the prospect of a world no longer anchored by American primacy.
Through the seminar, students will grapple with these shifts in global politics and their consequences for the future of trade and security, the unraveling of multilateral cooperation, and the role of populist politics in driving foreign policy. To enrich this exploration, the course will bring together diverse perspectives – academic, professional, and cultural – that challenge assumptions about U.S. power and prompt new ways of thinking about global leadership.
This course emphasises the development of practical skills that extend beyond the classroom, beginning with focused training that will be applied and refined throughout the remainder of the seminar. A high level of initiative is expected: students will not only engage with the readings but also take ownership of class discussions, preparing to interact directly with the Lind Initiative’s visiting speakers. Students are required to attend the evening public lectures that follow each seminar session, where ideas from the classroom will be placed in conversation with world-leading thinkers and practitioners.
The 2026 Lind Initiative series is hosted at the UBC Vancouver campus, located on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the Musqueam people.
Our lineup of speakers will be announced this fall. Join the Lind Initiative mailing list to receive updates as soon as they’re released. The Lind Initiative is presented by UBC’s School of Public Policy and Global Affairs in partnership with Chan Centre for the Performing Arts.
This series is made possible through a generous gift from the late Philip B. Lind that was recently extended by the Lind family in his honour. Read more here.
Contact info: lind.initiative@ubc.ca
