New School Global Studies

Global Studies is an interdisciplinary major that focuses on social transformation and innovative responses to seemingly intractable problems. Global Studies students learn to think across disciplines, to move between the scales of the local and the global, and not to lose sight of the realities of human lives at the center of our investigations.

As it fundamentally changes the world, globalization restructures the way states, societies, communities, and individuals relate to each other, creating new challenges that cannot be met by nations or markets alone—challenges such as climate change, nuclear proliferation, human trafficking, international trade regulations, poverty and hunger, the effects of new communications technology, and unprecedented migration. Global Studies prepares students to understand these problems with the aim of realizing a more just and equitable world. To this end, each student is required to demonstrate competency in a foreign language, complete fieldwork research or an internship experience and focus their studies on a course cluster.