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The Study of International Politics II: International Political Economy
Course Organization
E583 - Autumn - 6 ECTS
Thursdays 14:15-16:00
Rigot, R2
Professor:
David Sylvan
david.sylvan@graduateinstitute.ch
Tel. +41 22 908 5942
Office hours:
Wednesdays, 16:30-17:30
Rigot 28
Assistant:
Assia Alexieva
assia.alexieva@graduateinstitute.ch
Tel. +41 22 908 5948
Office hours:
Tuesdays, 14:30-16:30
Rigot 35
Course Description
The idea of this course is to introduce students to ways of thinking critically about international political economy. To this end, we will read, discuss, and reconstruct theories of various phenomena drawn from five different approaches. These approaches provide alternative definitions of the historical development of capitalism and its connection to what we in political science typically call the "international states system." The course is thus simultaneously theoretical and historical in its focus; it is also self-contained: there are no course prerequisites.
I referred above to the goal of thinking critically about international political economy. This means, first, that you write, for your own purposes, summaries of the overall argument of each reading. Second, you should take critical notes on each reading: for example, what, if any, weaknesses do you see in the argument? What additional cases could one use to determine the argument’s validity? How far can one extend the argument in time and space? Are there similarities or differences to other readings from that or other paradigms? Does the argument have theoretical implications? Finally, you will have to participate in class discussions. This does not mean giving an opinion on a general topic vaguely related to the week’s reading; instead, you must come to class prepared to say something specific and critical (though not necessarily negative) about the reading.
To facilitate critical thinking, you will have to do several kinds of formal writing assignments. One is to compose a short argument (ca. three paragraphs) taking a particular side on a question I pose on the readings for a given week; this will happen twice over the semester and your argument (and that of another student taking the opposite position) will be posted on a class weblog. Everyone else in the class will then, on two occasions during the semester, have to post a very brief comment (a few sentences) responding to one or both of the arguments. This blog will only be open to people in the course (it will be password-protected) and will be taken down at the end of the semester.
Another kind of writing I want you to do is more structured: to write two analytical papers on particular readings. I will put together four paper assignments and post them early in the semester; you will have to do two of them.You decide for which assignments you wish to write papers; but you must hand in the papers by the beginning of class. I in turn will undertake to grade the papers and return them at the end of class the following week. These papers must not be written in response to assignments covering authors for which you are doing a blog argument (the point, obviously, is to avoid duplication and induce you to look at additional materials more carefully).
A third kind of writing, aimed at helping pull together the various ideas in the course, will be in the form of a take-home final test. I will give you either 48 or 72 hours to do this; there will be two essay questions covering a fairly wide terrain.
Course mechanics
1) You will have to buy a photocopy packet for the course. 2) Journal articles and some older books are available online; books chapters for the first few weeks of the course are also available online, in password-protected form. Optional readings should eventually all be available at the library. Of course, you are free to purchase any particular books for your own purposes. 3) Grades for the course: the two weblog arguments together will count for 25% of your grade and the two comments on others’ arguments 8% together; the two analytic papers together will count for 1/3 of your grade; and the final will also count for 1/3. I will round grades up or down to the nearest quarter-point on the basis of class participation. I will also take account of improvement over time in the course: if weblog comments or papers get better as the semester continues, I will count the later ones more than the earlier ones.
This syllabus, the paper and web assignments, lists of students, office hours, etc. may all be found on the course website: http://graduateinstitute.ch/political-science/international-political-economy-2008_en.html
Course Syllabus and Class Schedule
0. Introduction: the concept of paradigms in international political economy
September 18
No reading
1. Actions by individuals, firms, and governments
a. The argument in its classic form
September 25
Required reading:
- Norman Angell, The Great Illusion (1908), chs. 1-9 (Heinemann ed., 1933): 77-266. Available in Additional Materials (password protected).
Optional readings:
b. Two extensions
October 2
Web Assignment
Required reading:
- Eric Helleiner, "Reinterpreting Bretton Woods: International Development and the Neglected Origins of Embedded Liberalism," Development and Change 37,5 (2006): 943-67.
- Rawi Abdelal, "Writing the Rules of Global Finance: France, Europe, and Capital Liberalization," R. of International Political Economy 13,1 (2006): 1-27.
- Kenneth A. Schultz and Barry R. Weingast, "The Democratic Advantage: Institutional Foundations of Financial Power in International Competition," International Organization 57,1 (2003): 3-42.
- Gregory Clark, A Farewell to Alms: A Brief Economic History of the World (Princeton 2007), chs. 12-13.
Optional readings:
- Kenneth Pomeranz, The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy (Princeton 2000), chs. 5-6.
- Philip T. Hoffman and Jean-Laurent Rosenthal, "Divided We Fall: The Political Economy of Warfare and Taxation," http://www.hss.caltech.edu/~pth/Papers/newtaxunityapsr.doc
2. Modes of production and ideal-typical motivations
a. Before capitalism
October 9
Web Assignment
Required reading:
- Eric R. Wolf, Europe and the People Without History (California 1982), chs. 2-8: pp. 24-261. Note: I expect you to have read only chs. 2-5 for the class session; the remaining three chapters must have been read by the beginning of class on October 23. Available in Additional Materials (password protected).
Optional readings:
- Janet Abu-Lughod, Before European Hegemony: The World System A.D. 1250-1350 (Oxford 1989).
- Timothy J. Yeager, "Encomienda or Slavery? The Spanish Crown’s Choice of Labor Organization in Sixteenth-Century Spanish America," J. of Economic History 55,4 (1995): 842-59.
- Peter Temin, "A Market Economy in the Early Roman Empire," J. of Roman Studies 91 (2001): 169-81.
- Jack Goody, The Theft of History (Cambridge 2006), ch. 4.
- [Although they are not directly relevant, two somewhat speculative recent works by nonhistorians arguably are compatible with this approach: Jared Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, 1997; and Charles G. Mann, 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus, 2005.]
b. Capitalism as a possibility
i. Origins and spread
October 16
Web Assignment
First paper due.
Required readings:
Optional readings:
- Joseph Schumpeter, "The Sociology of Imperialisms" (1919), trans. H. Norden. http://www.mises.org/books/imperialism.pdf (note: the essay is pp. 1-98).
- R.H. Tawney, Religion and the Rise of Capitalism (1926).
- Albert O. Hirschman, "Rival Interpretations of Market Society: Civilizing, Destructive, or Feeble?" J. of Economic Literature 20,3 (1982): 1463-84.
ii. The implications of the transition
October 23
Web Assignment
Required readings:
- Immanuel Wallerstein, The Modern World-System II: Mercantilism and the Consolidation of the European World-Economy, 1600-1750 (Academic 1980), chs. 2-4, 6: 36-175, 244-89.
- Thomas Mun, England’s Treasure by Forraign Trade (1663; orig. written 1626-30), ch. 19. http://socserv.mcmaster.ca/econ/ugcm/3ll3/mun/treasure.txt
Optional readings:
- Thomas A. Brady, Jr., "The Rise of Merchant Empires, 1400-1700: A European Counterpoint," in James D. Tracy, ed., The Political Economy of Merchant Empires: State Power and World Trade 1350-1750 (Cambridge 1991).
- Benno Teschke, "Theorizing the Westphalian System of States: International Relations from Absolutism to Capitalism," European J. of International Relations 8,1 (2002): 5-48.
3. Spatial reasoning: clustering and propinquity
a. Thinking geographically
October 30
Web Assignment
Second paper due.
Required reading:
- D.W. Meinig, "The Continuous Shaping of America: A Prospectus for Geographers and Historians," American Historical R. 83,5 (1978): 1186-1205.
- Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, rev. edn. (Verso 1991): chs. 1-4.
- Eliga H. Gould, "Entangled Histories, Entangled Worlds: The English-Speaking Atlantic as a Spanish Periphery," American Historical R. 112,3 (2007): 764-86.
Optional readings:
- D. W. Meinig, The Shaping of America: A Geographical Perspective on 500 Years of History, vol. 1: Atlantic America, 1492-1800 (Yale 1986), pt. 1; pt. 2, chs. 10-11, 17-19; pt. 3, chs. 1-2, 7-10, 13, 15; and pt. 4: 3-76, 160-90, 226-70, 295-338, 370-85, 395-407, 421-54.
- John Elliott, Empires of the Atlantic World: Britain and Spain in America 1492-1830 (Yale 2006), chs. 6, 8.
- John Agnew, "No Borders, No Nations: Making Greece in Macedonia," Annals of the Association of American Geographers," 97,2 (2007): 398-422.
b. Class development
November 6
Web Assignment
Required readings:
- Michael T. Taussig, The Devil and Commodity Fetishism in South America (North Carolina 1980), chs. 3-5, 8, 11-13.
Optional readings:
- Johan Galtung, "A Structural Theory of Imperialism," J. of Peace Research 8,2 (1971): 81-117.
- James Heartfield, "China’s Comprador Capitalism is Coming Home," R. of Radical Political Economics 37,2 (2005): 196-214.
- Fernando Henrique Cardoso and Enzo Faletto, Dependency and Development in Latin America, trans. M. Urquidi (written 1966-67, publ. 1969; Engl. trans. California 1979).
- Fernando Henrique Cardoso, "New Paths: Reflections About Some Challenges of Globalization," 2007.
4. System logic
a. Commodities, commodification, and capitalism
November 13
Web Assignment
Required reading:
- Karl Marx, Capital (1867-94), vol. 1, chs. 1-2, 4, 6-7, 10, 12, 26-33. The easiest thing by far is to read the online edition, which uses the well-known Engl. trans. by Moore and Aveling, and was edited by Engels: http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ However, the Fowkes trans.(Vintage 1977) is more accurate and captures more of Marx’s literary flair.
Optional readings:
b. Discipline and surveillance
November 20
Web Assignment
Required reading:
- Michel Foucault, Surveiller et punir: Naissance de la prison (Gallimard 1975), pts. 3-4: 135-315. [This is written in beautiful French; but for those who would prefer a flattened and not always accurate English translation, I have made available A. Sheridan’s: Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison (Vintage 1979), 133-308.]
Optional readings:
- Charles E. Lindblom, "The Market as Prison," J. of Politics 44,2 (1982): 324-36.
- Stephen Gill, "The Global Panopticon? The Neoliberal State, Economic Life, and Democratic Surveillance," Alternatives 20,1 (1995): 1-49.
- Morgan Brigg, "Post-development, Foucault and the Colonisation Metaphor," Third World Q. 23,3 (2002): 421-36.
- Jakob Vestergaard, "The Asian Crisis and the Shaping of the ‘Proper’ Economies," Cambridge J. of Economics 28,6 (2004): 809-27.
c. Race
November 27
Web Assignment
Third paper due.
Required reading:
Optional readings:
- Edward W. Said, Orientalism (Random House 1978), chs. 1, 3 (Vintage edn. 1979: 29-110, 200-328).
- Richard Drinnon, Facing West: The Metaphysics of Indian-Hating and Empire-Building, 2d edn. (Schocken 1990), pt. 4.
- Mona Domosh, "Selling Civilization: Toward a Cultural Analysis of America’s Economic Empire in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries," Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 29,4 (2004): 453-67.
5. Society as decentered ensemble
a. The invention and decline (?) of self-regulation
December 4 [Note: I will be out of town on this day so we will have to reschedule the class session]
Web Assignment
Fourth paper due.
Required reading:
- Karl Polanyi, The Great Transformation: The Political and Economic Origins of Our Time [1944] (Rinehart 1957).
Optional readings:
- Antonio Gramsci, "State and Civil Society" (1929-35), trans. Q. Hoare, in Selections from the Prison Notebooks (International Publishers 1971).
- E.P. Thompson, "The Moral Economy of the English Crowd in the Eighteenth Century," Past and Present 50 (1971): 76-136.
- John Gerard Ruggie, "International Regimes, Transactions, and Change: Embedded Liberalism in the Postwar Economic Order," Int. Org. 36,2 (1982): 379-415.
- A. Claire Cutler, "Locating ‘Authority’ in the Global Political Economy," International Studies Q. 43,1 (1999): 59-81
b. Consumption and emulation
Web Assignment
Required readings:
Optional readings:
- Sidney W. Mintz, Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History (Viking Penguin 1985).
- T. J. Clark, The Painting of Modern Life: Paris in the Art of Manet and his Followers (Princeton 1984), intro., chs. 1, 3-4: 3-78, 147-258.
- Woodruff D. Smith, "Complications of the Commonplace: Tea, Sugar, and Imperialism," J. of Interdisciplinary History 23,2 (1992): 259-78.
- Kenneth Pomeranz and Steven Topik, The World that Trade Created: Society, Culture, and the World Economy 1400 to the Present (M.E. Sharpe 1999), ch. 3.
December 18
No class; take-home test during the week.
Additional information and readings of the course are available upon login at the bottom of this page.
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