POL S 409 A: Undergraduate Seminar In Political Economy

We consider contemporary comparative political economy and macroeconomics through the lens of the past decade, in which advanced industrial economies experienced massive technological change, speculative bubbles, financial crisis, unrelenting recession, widening inequality, and the return of early 20th century debates on the appropriate role of government in managing the business cycle. Through discussion and papers on a mixture of popular and academic readings, we tackle three key questions: What happened during the financial crisis, what political economic changes followed in its wake, and what's next?  Student evaluation will be based on participation in class discussions, a small number of short reaction papers based on course readings, and a final paper of 10 to 12 pages.