Understanding the drivers of conflict are paramount to developing capabilities that improve or complement partner defense institutions.  This course provides political-military analysis to help inform understanding of our partners.  We explore strategic culture and how that informs security choices and uses analyzes small wars to explore various motivations for conflicts.  By studying social identify and how anger, fear and resentment fuel conflicts, we can tailor SC approaches to address root causes of issues rather than just the surface symptoms of instability.  This leads to more sustainable and satisfying resolutions and will help the SC professional craft more nuanced and finely tuned capabilities.  In the first session, we approach strategic culture, what goes into it, some criticisms, and discuss how strategic culture influences defense institutions.  This is a partner-focused session.  In the second session, we are going to dive into the idea of culture and society, what it is, what makes groups- a normative approach. This is an environment-focused session. Third session, we talk different levels of conflicts, and how that shapes partners security choices.  We'll talk something called 'technological determinism' and why it sucks.  This is a partner-focused session.  Fourth session, we'll take a deeper look at some aspects of identity that seems to have outsize effects on conflicts and small wars.  In the fifth session, we'll talk about some motivations for conflict, particularly at the small war level.  We'll really crack open this idea of socio-economic orders and why men (and women) rebel.