PPGA 591C Lind Initiative Seminar
WHAT: A 3-credit course
WHEN: Thursdays, 3:30-5:30 PM, Winter Term 2, January-April, 2027
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: TBC
DEADLINE: September 25th, 2026
SUBMIT APPLICATION FORM HERE
*Applications will be reviewed and accepted on a rolling basis.
Course Title: A Moment of Rupture? Democracy, Disruption, and the U.S. Political Order
Donald Trump’s return to the White House has been called a rupture — from democratic norms, from the postwar alliance system, from established economic models, and from the rules-based international order the United States built. Historians would point out that American unilateralism, imperial overreach, economic disruption and democratic backsliding all have deep roots, and that none of them arrived with a single administration. Both things can also be true.
This course takes the idea of rupture seriously without taking it for granted. Over the term we will examine the forces at work in this moment of disorder — the erosion of public trust, the rise of artificial intelligence, a new era of wealth inequality, and the hollowing out of democratic institutions — and we will keep returning to three key questions:
• What is genuinely broken, and what has merely been revealed?
• What can be repaired, and what is already beyond recovery?
• And what does this moment demand of us?
How it works: This class has two parts, both of which are mandatory.
• The afternoon (3:30-5:30pm): A private graduate seminar with that week’s invited speaker. You and your fellow students will lead the discussions, shaping the questions and taking ownership of the conversation.
• The evening (6:30-8:00pm): The public lecture, delivered by the same speaker, in front of the wider Lind audience. Please note not all classes will have an evening session.
In the seminar, you will have the opportunity to take ownership of conversations with our visiting speakers. Leading a conversation well is its own kind of thinking, and the course is designed to develop it alongside a close exploration of this year’s theme of rupture.
You will get focused training in facilitation: how to structure and guide a discussion, how to ask questions that open a subject rather than close it, and how to engage seriously with people you disagree with. Then you will use it, every week, in a room with someone who has spent a career thinking about the thing you are discussing. You will require initiative, along with a willingness to sit with disagreement and to treat it as material for inquiry rather than a problem to resolve.
The 2027 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.
Questions about the Lind Initiative seminar may be directed to: lind.initiative@ubc.ca
