POL SCI 790 / The Politics of Economic Policy in Market Economies

3 unit(s)

H. Jacek

This seminar examines the complex relationship between the worlds of politics and economics. The primary theme will be the modern state’s struggle to maintain political autonomy and problem-solving capabilities in the face of internal economic demands that are often incompatible with the pressures of external policy actors. Our geographical focus will be on the advanced market economies and the comparative public policy literature that has grown up over the past fifty years on these countries. Our approach will be explicitly comparative yet I do not expect students to have prior specialized knowledge of these countries. I expect the members of this seminar to become familiar with the public policy literature on the influence of politics on economics and to gain an appreciation of the data policy-makers and scholars use, how these data are assembled and the strengths and weaknesses of the analyses of the political economy literature.