Denmark

This course introduces "open" tools and methods for processing and visualizing data types such as structured data, text data, and temporal data. It discusses the opportunities and challenges in relation to working with large amounts of data, including ethical conditions regarding data acquisition, storage, aggregation, publication, and use. The course applies theories and concepts to define and analyze issues relating to large amounts of data. Students learn to develop solutions for retrieval and sorting structured and unstructured data, as well as process and represent data visually. The course largely involves hands-on cases working with relevant data sets, including an introduction to the language Python and the use of Python for data analysis such as text mining and sentiment analysis. It also introduces the principles behind FAIR data and explores ethical issues when working with open data.

This course provides students with an analytical qualitative foundation for developing a business strategy for an organization based on tools within the area of strategic management, and draws on different theories of economic value creation. The course begins by covering central terms, concepts, and definitions in the area of strategy such as the mission, vision, and strategy of an organization, and then looks into different ways in which a strategy can be developed. In connection to this, behavioralism is discussed along with the idea of bounded rationality. This is followed by a discussion on how the environment of a company can be mapped and analyzed and how Porters Five Forces framework builds on the neoclassical theory and the structure of conduct performance paradigm. The course determines competitive advantages and how economic value is created through the internal resources, activities, and competencies of the firm. Furthermore, tools for mapping and analyzing the political and cultural context of the company are presented in connection to principal/agent theory and behavioralistic theory. After this, corporate strategies, business/competitive strategies, international strategies, growth strategies, and strategies on innovation are discussed. The different roles for the patterning company and the size of the corporation are covered drawing on transaction cost theory. When looking at the competitive strategies of the company, the course discusses the importance of long-term commitment and game theory. Furthermore, it is concerned with entrepreneurship, innovation, and internationalization. Finally, it looks at how to evaluate different strategies concerning their suitability, acceptability, and feasibility. The last section of the course looks at how companies can implement their strategies through organizational and management design and manage strategic change. Again, the course returns to the ideas of bounded rationality and the management of stakeholders introduced within behavioral theory.

This course covers important theories and conceptual models for analyzing and understanding organizations in order to design effective structures and cultures that allow them to create value, survive, develop, and thrive. It investigates how employees do not always act in a rational and consistent manner: whether as a new employee, a middle manager, or a top-level executive, the ability to understand, explain, and predict human behavior in organizations is a valuable skill. The course studies a wide range of organizational situations and examples and connects them to organizational theories and effective management methods. It bridges theory and practice through organizational analysis by exploring a series of successful and unsuccessful examples. Students learn to apply different theoretical perspectives to provide situational analysis and plausible solutions. Rather than providing a singular model of an effective organization that can be applied universally, the course explores the factors and conditions within and outside an organization that can be controlled to provide the best fit with the dynamic environment and thereby create the greatest opportunity for success. The imperative for organizational learning, continuous adaptation, and change based on new developments is emphasized.

The course explores different aspects of Danish culture such as literature, mythology, history, film, music, architecture, painting, the welfare state, and national identity. The course is a unique combination of lectures and excursions, which includes trips to the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art and Frederiksborg Castle. NOTE: This version of the course (50 B) is worth 6 quarter units and requires a 10-page paper.

This course studies the relationship between economic crises and the cluster of policy solutions known as austerity. It explores why austerity is often seen as the most efficacious solution to economic downturn, and considers whether resorting to austerity in the present repeats errors of the past in light of the history of crises of capitalism. The course reviews the intellectual roots of austerity and examines the institutional and ideational factors that explain its widespread use by policy-makers in the present period. It considers whether austerity as a policy package is either compatible with or sustainable under democratic politics. The course examines the social impact of austerity budgeting in areas such as public health and discusses the emergent politics of anti-austerity on both sides of the political spectrum. It draws mostly on literature from the political science subfields of comparative and international economy, as well as the fields of macroeconomics, economic history, sociology and public health.

This course provides a survey of Danish design, focusing foremost on the post-war era (1945-1960s). It concentrates on a design tradition world renowned for, amongst other things, high-quality craftsmanship, functionality, humanism, contextualism, simplicity, comprehensiveness, and creative continuity between tradition and renewal. Design is never merely a question of beautiful forms and surfaces, and therefore this course purposefully explores below the surface. It examines wider issues of ethics and aesthetics as exemplified in designs for the Welfare State. The course presents in-depth examinations into a diversity of design fields and design culture movements in order to reveal the essential considerations and contexts shaping some of Denmark’s most successful post-war designs. Material designs ranging in scale “from the spoon to the city,” as well as immaterial designs, are probed and discussed in relation to their socio-cultural, political, economic, and technical contexts. It critically questions the given topics through such lenses as design as common good, shattering the familiar, women in Danish design, and decolonizing design history. Furthermore, field studies to significant local sites afford opportunities to challenge experiential blindness and deepen place-based learning. Zooming in on Danish design of the past, including its roles in shaping the Welfare State, this course explores the meanings and purposes of design, and the ways design can enrich everyday life. Focusing on Danish design of the past is also significant to shed new light on understandings of contemporary societal issues and design’s roles in relation to these, and help transform comprehensions of how sustainable and equitable futures may be envisioned and constituted.