Course Meeting Times
Seminar: 2 sessions / week, 2 hours / session
Course Overview
This graduate class is designed as a Ph.D.–level overview of international political economy (IPE), with an emphasis on the advanced industrial countries. It also serves as preparation for the IPE portion of the International Relations general exam. The course is divided into three sections: international trade; international monetary and financial relations (including foreign direct investment); and "other topics."
An important goal of the course is to use economic theories to identify the welfare effects, distributional consequences, and security implications of foreign economic policy decisions, and to use the tools of political science to analyze how interest groups, voters, political parties, electoral institutions, ideas, and power politics interact to shape policy outcomes. It is my hope that this course will generate ideas for your own research, leading to publishable papers and dissertation topics.
Prerequisites
MIT students must receive the permission of the instructor.
Course Requirements and Grading
Students are expected to read each article or chapter closely, and to come to class prepared to discuss and critique the readings.
| ACTIVITIES | PERCENTAGES |
|---|---|
| Class participation | 25% |
| Reaction papers | 15% |
| Research proposal | 60% |
Readings
Students were asked to purchase the following books:
Frieden, Jeffry A. Global Capitalism: Its Fall and Rise in the Twentieth Century. W. W. Norton & Company, 2006. ISBN: 9780393058086.
Mosley, Layna. Global Capital and National Governments (Cambridge Studies in Comparative Politics). Cambridge University Press, 2003. ISBN: 9780521521628. [Preview with Google Books]
Students were encouraged to consult a good international economics textbook such as:
Caves, Richard E., Jeffrey A. Frankel, and Ronald W. Jones. World Trade and Payments: An Introduction (10th Edition, International Edition). Pearson, 2007. ISBN: 9780321248558.
Krugman, Paul R., Maurice Obstfeld, and Marc Melitz. International Economics (9th Edition). Prentice Hall, 2011. ISBN: 9780132146654. [Preview with Google Books]
Accessible discussions of many of the economic theories discussed in the readings can be found in:
Grieco, Joseph M., and G. John Ikenberry. State Power and World Markets: The International Political Economy. W. W. Norton & Company, 2002. ISBN: 9780393974195.
Oatley, Thomas. International Political Economy (5th Edition). Longman, 2011. ISBN: 9780205060634.
An excellent reference on the history of international monetary relations is:
Eichengreen, Barry. Globalizing Capital: A History of the International Monetary System (Second Edition). Princeton University Press, 2008. ISBN: 9780691139371. [Preview with Google Books]