You will write one Op-Ed. First draft due on Wednesday. Final draft due on Monday of the final week. I would like to see bibliographies, although real Op-Eds do not utilize them. You should use at least three legitimate (non-Wikipedia) sources.
Op-Eds (Opinion Editorials) are guest editorials written by distinguished thinkers, former or present government officials, and other news makers. They are also written by columnists of distinction. For instance, the New York Times publishes Op-Eds not only by former government officials and Nobel prize winners, but also those written by a stable of reporters and columnists of note.
Here is a great resource for New York Times Op-Eds:
Scroll down to the lower right corner, where you will find a box labeled “OpEd Columnists.”
The best-known New York Times Op-Ed columnists are listed there. You can go to any of them and click on “Columns” for a new page with the latest Op-Eds by that columnist, along with a search menu for their previous Op-Eds. (For instance, you can click on “Columns” under Frank Rich, and then on the new page, you can enter “Iraq” in the search field. After you hit the “go” button, you will get all columns by Mr. Rich with the word “Iraq.”)
This is a gold mine that you should take advantage of.
I recommend Op-Ed columnists Thomas Friedman, Nicholas Kristof, Maureen Dowd, Frank Rich, and David Brooks.
One very respected Op-Ed columnist and analyst is Charles Krauthammer, a fascinating fellow who is a physician, but who spends most of his time writing about world affairs.
Go here for a list of some of his Op-Eds:
More recent Krauthammer Op-Eds in the Washington Post are here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/charles-krauthammer/2011/02/24/ADJkW7B_page.html
Here is a very useful page of Op-Eds by faculty at the Kennedy School of Government: http://www.hks.harvard.edu/news-events/news/op-eds
Here is a resource for Thomas Friedman's columns: http://www.nytimes.com/top/opinion/editorialsandoped/oped/columnists/thomaslfriedman/index.htm
Here are some of his Pulitzer Prize-winning articles: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/08/nyregion/_08commentary.1.htm?ex=1162702800&en=123c4911cffd3e26&ei=5070
Also, here is "The Daily Op-Ed," a compendium of Op-Eds from US newspapers, updated every day.
Your Op-Ed can be written on just about any topic in international politics that interests you. It should be roughly 700 words – that is about two and a half pages, double spaced. Use the word counter on your word processing application. Easy.
Do not use footnotes in your Op-Ed. The Op-Ed style is not formal enough for that. It is the sort of article that should be both readable and well-argued. You can mention a source (and certainly mention evidence supporting your argument) in your Op-Ed, but tread lightly.
So you could do it something like this:
"Surely now is the time to end the mining of dilithium in Norway. Non-toxic, synthetic dilithium is widely used in Klingon and Romulan spacecraft, and according to the Federation Dilithium Study Group, continued mining of the mineral is not only unnecessary but will lead to genetic mutations of Norwegians for generations to come."
Notice how the author worked in the reference to the Federation Dilithium Study Group but did not do it in such a way that it was plodding or overly technical – nor was a footnote used.
Oh, this is why you should never use Wikipedia as a source for a paper:
The above is an article by journalist John Seigenthaler, who was defamed by false information published on Wikipedia.
Ironically, Wikipedia has an article of its own on the controversy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Seigenthaler_Sr._Wikipedia_biography_controversy
