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Description:
This course introduces students to the modal interdisciplinary approach of political economy, an approach that de-centers economics from a narrow focus on optimization and hype-rationality to a broader vision of how the behavior of homo sapiens acting as economic agents is shaped by social and psychological processes. Thus, the determinants of economic outcomes are similarly impacted by emotional and social context. This course will offer a critical exploration of how the works of Adam Smith, David Ricardo, Karl Marx, Amartya Sen, and others have informed approaches to the study of political economy. Topics to be explored include: how socially constructed concepts of gender (as opposed to biological sex) and race/ethnicity impact value distribution; power dynamics in the workplace and larger society; and social investment thereby shaping the cultural architecture and economic processes that contribute to inequality. One of the objectives of this course is to specifically address the role of capital accumulation and mercantilist tendencies in modern capitalist economies in the diminution of productive self-employment, family businesses, and other alternatives to large-scale enterprises, leading to distorted forms of development resulting in catastrophic effects to the global ecology.
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