Political Science 462/566
Topics in International Political Economy
Instructor: Dr. Rob Aitken Winter 2007
Tory 10-29, 492-0539 Time: T 930-1220
e-mail: raitken@ualberta.ca Room: CW 4-46
website: http://www.ualberta.ca/~raitken/
office hours: Wednesdays 1.30-4.30 or by appointment
Course Overview
This course is an advanced seminar in International Political Economy (IPE). This seminar explores recent theoretical debates within IPE relating to economic globalization and situates those debates within longer intellectual currents relating to ‘economy’, ‘society’, the market, culture, the political and traditions of critical political economy. The course addresses both mainstream traditions within IPE as well as critical and recent interventions within the field. The course also reviews and explores key processes within the global political economy. This includes processes relating to investment, finance, intellectual property, trade, consumption, political activism/action, and other practices central to the regulation of the global economy. Particular attention is given to the changing role of the state and to the broad debates relating to the question of governance at the global level.
Course Requirements
Seminar Attendance and Participation 15%
Critical Analysis Assignment 15%
Research paper proposal (Due February 13 2007) 15%
Seminar Facilitation Assignment 25%
Final Research Paper (Due April 3 2007) 30%
Note: Course assignments and requirements will be described and organized during the first two weeks of the course—January 9 and January 16 2007.
Support for Students with Disabilities
Students who require accommodation in this course due to a disability are invited to drop by my office during the first week of class to discuss any questions, concerns or specific arrangements. Also, if you have not already done so, discuss your needs with Specialized Support and Disability Services, 2-800 Students’ Union Building, 492-3381 (phone) or 492-7269 (TTY), http://www.ualberta.ca/ssds.
Class Objectives and Format
This class consists of one three-hour seminar each week. The course will be organized in seminar format which emphasizes student participation and leadership. Students are expected to come to each seminar prepared not only to participate but also to listen with and engage with other students. Typically I will begin each seminar with a few of my own comments as well as some of the context for questions I want us to discuss. The second half of each seminar will be managed by one or more students who will raise their own questions which will guide our discussion. All required readings must be completed in advance of the seminar and all students must bring some questions/comments/feedback to the seminar regarding the assigned readings.
Schedule of Course Readings and Themes
Part 1—Theory and Debates in Political Economy
Week 1-Introduction and Organization.
Reading:
Robert W. Cox, ‘Beyond Empire and Terror: Critical Reflections on the Political Economy of World Order,’ New Political Economy 9:3 (September 2004): 307-323
Required Readings:
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto (London: Penguin, 1985 [1888]): 78-105.
Gordon Bigelow, “Let There be Markets: The Evangelical Roots of Economics,” Harper’s Magazine 310:1860 (May 2005): 33-38.
John Maynard Keynes, The End of Laissez-Faire (Amherst NY: Prometheus Books, 2004 [1926]): 15-45.
Recommended Readings:
Thorstein Veblen, The Theory of the Leisure Class (Amherst NY: Prometheus Books, 1998): 22-34.
Week 3—Nationalism and Liberalism in International Political Economy
Required Readings:
Razeen Sally, Classical Liberalism and International Economic Order: Studies in Theory and Intellectual History (London: Routledge, 2002): Chapter 1, “What is Classical Liberalism?”, pp. 15-34.
Eric Helleiner, “Economic Nationalism as a Challenge to Economic Liberalism?: Lessons from the 19th Century,” International Studies Quarterly 46 (2002): 307-329.
Friederich List, The National System of Political Economy: Book 2 Theory (Kitchener ON: Batoche Books, 2001): Chapter 11 “Political and Cosmopolitical Economy”, pp. 117-129.
Background Readings:
F. A. von Hayek, The Road to Serfdom (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956 [1944]).
Karl Polanyi, The Great Transformation: The Political and Economic Origins of Our Times (Boston: Beacon Press, 1944): 43-55, 68-76, 130-150, 249-258b.
Robert W. Cox, “Gramsci, Hegemony and International Relations: An Essay in Method,” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 12:2 (1983): 162-175.
William I. Robinson, “Gramsci and Globalisation: From Nation-State to Transnational Hegemony,” Images of Gramsci: Connections and Contentions in Political Theory and International Relations eds. Andreas Bieler and Adam David Morton (London: Roultledge/RIPE, 2006): 165-180.
Background Readings:
Antonio Gramsci, Selection From the Prison Notebooks, Ed./Tr. Q. Hoare and G. Nowell-Smith (London: Lawrence and Wishart).
Week 5—Constructivism and Feminism in IPE
February 6 2007
Required Readings:
Feminism:
Ruth Pearson, “The Social is Political: Towards the Re-Politicization of Feminist Analysis of the Global Economy,” International Journal of Feminist Politics 6:4 (2004): 603-622.
V. Spike Peterson, “How (the Meaning of) Gender Matters in Political Economy,” New Political Economy 10:4 (December 2004): 499-521.
Constructivism:
Mark Blyth: Great Transformations: Economic Ideas and Institutional Change in the Twentieth Century. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002): 17-45.
Recommended Reading:
Anna M. Agathangelou and L.H.M. Ling, “Power, Borders, Security, Wealth: Lessons of Violence and Desire from September 11,” International Studies Quarterly 48 (2004): 517-538.
Jacqueline Best, The Limits of Transparency: Ambiguity and the History of International Finance. Ithaca NY: Cornell University Press, 2005.
Week 6—Governmentality and Cultural Economy
February 13 2007
Required Readings:
Colin Gordon, “Governmental Rationality: An Introduction,” The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality. Eds. Graham Mitchell, Colin Gordon and Peter Miller (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991): 1-48 (selections).
Timothy Mitchell, Rule of Experts: Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002): 80-119.
Recommended Readings:
Peter Miller and Nikolas Rose, “Governing Economic Life,” Economy and Society 19:1 (1990).
Marieke de Goede, “Introduction: International Political Economy and the Promises of Poststructuralism,” International Political Economy and Postructural Politics. Ed. Marieke de Goede (London: Palgrave, 2006): 1-20.
Paul du Gay and Michael Pyrke, Cultural Economy (London: Sage, 2002).
Michel Foucault, “Governmentality,” The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality. Eds. Graham Mitchell, Colin Gordon and Peter Miller (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991): 87-104.
Part 2—Processes and Issues in the Global Political Economy
Week 7—From Bretton Woods to Neoliberalism
February 27 2007
Required Readings:
John Gerard Ruggie, “International Regimes, Transactions and Change: Embedded Liberalism in the Postwar Economic Order,” International Organization 36:2 (1982): 379-415. (pages in particular)
J.M. Keynes, “National Self-Sufficiency,” The Yale Review XXII (1933): 755-769.
Mark Rupert, Ideologies of Globalization: Contending Visions of New World Order. (London: RIPE/Routledge, 2000): 42-64.
Recommended Readings:
Stephen Gill, Power and Resistance in the New World Order. (New York: Palgrave, 2003).
Week 8—Finance High finance Maybe combine 8 and 9 into one week
March 6 2007
Readings:
Tony Porter, The Globalization of Finance (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2005): 31-45.
Eric Helleiner, The Re-Emergence of Global Finance: From Bretton Woods to the 1990s (Ithaca NY: Cornell University Press, 1994): 1-22.
Paul Langley, “(Re)Politicizing Global Financial Governance: What’s ‘new’ About the ‘New International Financial Architecture,” Global Networks 4:1 (2004): 69-87.
Week 9—Low finance
March 13 2007
Readings:
David Grover, “Would Local Currencies Make a Good Local Economic Development Policy Tool? The Case of Ithaca Hours,” Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy 24 (2006): 719-737.
Eric Helleiner, “Think Globally, Transact Locally: Green Political Economy and the Local Currency Movement,” Global Society 14:1 (2000): 35-51.
Week 10—Governing Trade
March 20 2007
Readings:
Sol Picciotto, “Private Rights vs Public Standards in the WTO,” Review of International Political Economy 10:3 (2003): 377-405.
Matthew Watson, “Towards a Polanyian Perspective on Fair Trade: Market-Based Relationships and the Act of Ethical Consumption,” Global Society 20:4 (2006): 436-451.
Week 11 Property in IPE: A New Enclosures or a New Commons?
March 27 2007
Required Readings:
Susan Sell, Private Power, Public Law: The Globalization of Intellectual Property Rights (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003): 96-120.
Steven Weber, The Success of Open Source (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2004): 224-254.
Week 12—Global Investment and National Policy
April 3 2007
Required Readings:
Gus Van Harten, “Private Authority and Transnational Governance: The Contours of the International System of Investor Protection,” Review of International Political Economy 12:4 (2005): 600-623.
Christoph Beat Graber, “The New UNESCO Convention on Cultural Diversity: A Counterbalance to the WTO?” Journal of International Economic Law 9:3 (2006): 553-574.
Week 13—The Global Political Economy of Consumption: Food
April 10 2007
Required Readings:
Lynne Philips, “Food and Globalization,” Annual Review of Anthropology 35 (2006): 37-57.
Christian Coff, The Taste for Ethics: An Ethic of Food Consumption (Dordrecht: Springer, 2006): Chapter 3 “The Storylessness of Food” pages 61-92.