Maastricht University – University College Maastricht

Full course description

Why would anyone choose to study philosophers who lived and wrote (more than) two millennia ago? One obvious answer is: to learn about one’s roots; to better understand Western culture and heritage. Up to this day, the ancient Greeks and Romans constitute a major influence on our ideas about critical thinking, about the fundamental character of Reality, about Science, Ethics, and Art, and last not least: about what it is to be human and about what it means for humans to flourish, to live truly good lives. Ancient philosophy provides an inexhaustible source of inspiration for contemporary philosophy. “The European philosophical tradition”, the philosopher Whitehead once remarked, “consists in a series of footnotes to Plato”. Slightly overstated, but not untrue.

In this course we will return to the sources and study the texts that helped us become who we are today. We will study a range of canonical philosophical texts from Antiquity, ranging from the Ionian Philosophers of Nature to Aristotle. Although we will attempt to position these treatises in their historical and geographic contexts, our main concern will be: what have these ancient thinkers still to say to us today?

One warning: even if you have some prior knowledge of ancient Greek philosophy, that doesn’t make this an easy course. Only choose this course if you are genuinely interested in reading ancient philosophical texts that do not always yield their secrets easily.

Course objectives

• To provide students with a basic introduction to ancient Greek philosophy;
• To teach students how to explore the meaning of philosophical texts by situating them in their historical contexts;
• To explore how our culture, and we as part of it, has been shaped by these ancient thinkers.

Prerequisites

None

Recommended

HUM1007 Introduction to Philosophy.

The course is divided into three sections. The first section starts with a focus on European Foreign Policy for foreign policy analysis and vice versa. It considers what theories in International Relations can help explain the conduct of European Foreign Policy. Next, the institutional framework of the EU’s foreign policy and the role of the member states in the formation of policy are considered. Finally, main external relations policies themselves are reviewed in detail. Main policy areas include: Common Defense Policy, Common Security Policy, Economic and Trade Policy, and Enlargement Policy. 

This course familiarizes students with: the epidemiology of mortality and disease; the determinants of health; the ageing of society and its implications for medical care; the unequal distribution of health; moral issues in public health; the economics of public health; health systems analysis; public health genomics; markets and public health; public health disasters. Students become familiar with public policymaking, including: the various components of public policy (values, objectives, instruments, policy paradigm); the concept of the policy cycle (problem recognition and definition, agenda building, policy formation, policy implementation, policy evaluation and feedback); theoretical approaches of public policy making (rational model, political model, institutionalist model); stakeholder and policy community analysis; types of state-society relationships (elitist model, pluralist model, corporatist model, regulatory agency model, communitarian model); the role of power in public policymaking.

Full course description

Interest in the concept of social and sustainable entrepreneurship has been sparked over the last two decades due to frustration with inefficient, ineffective and failed action of government and philanthropic bodies, as well as the socially destructive behaviour of many businesses. An explicit and central social/sustainable mission, innovation, creativity and a strong market orientation are the distinguishing features of social and sustainable entrepreneurship. Social and sustainable entrepreneurs are committed to furthering a social and/or sustainable mission, and rank social, environmental or cultural impact on a par with, or above, profit. At the intersection of business, government and not-for-profit organisations, these social and sustainable entrepreneurs are now visible and having an impact on a global scale.

This course will provide you the opportunity to learn how you can apply your knowledge and skills to address complex sustainability problems. This course is structured around experiential problem-based learning, providing you the opportunity to synthesise theory and practice as you develop an idea for your own social/sustainable enterprises. Topics will include: critically reviewing concepts; user centred-design of social and sustainable enterprises; frameworks for understanding and strategizing; understanding and reporting social and environmental impact; and cross-sector collaboration.

Course objectives

On the successful completion of this course you should be able to:

• Critically reflect on social and sustainable entrepreneurship theory and practice
• Identify and evaluate social and sustainable entrepreneurship opportunities
• Develop a strategy for a social/ sustainable enterprise
• Conduct primary research and analyse primary and secondary data in the field of social and sustainable entrepreneurship
• Prepare and present documentation to pitch a novel enterprise idea
• Learn to cope with the chaos and complexity of doing social and sustainable entrepreneurship in the real world.

Prerequisites

You need to have completed at least ONE of the following course: SSC2055 Entrepreneurship; SSC2036 Introduction to Business Administration OR SCI1016 Sustainable Development

Public economics (or public finance) is the study of the role of government in the economy. It deals with the formulation, execution, and effects of government policy, or more generally with non-market mediated policies. This study involves answering the following four broad questions: When should the government intervene in the economy? How might the government intervene? What is the effect of those interventions on economic outcomes? Why do governments choose to intervene in the way that they do? The government differs from other organizations because it can use legal instruments to enact policies and may also have different goals than other actors in the economy. The typical allocation mechanism for scarce resources in markets is the price mechanism, which – under particular circumstances – aggregates information and preferences of many different individuals in an efficient way. If these assumptions are not met or Pareto efficiency alone is not a sufficient criterion since a particular allocation is "unfair", there might be room for intervention by the public sector. We will discuss arguments for when government intervention is warranted and whether such intervention is beneficial. This course provides basic knowledge of the functioning and the relevance of the public sector. The topics include (i) market failures such as incomplete information, public goods, and externalities, (ii) issues with fairness, inequality, poverty, redistribution, and taxation, and (iii) political decision-making and elections. These topics will be analyzed from a normative (welfare economic) as well as from a positive (explanatory) perspective, with emphasis on the relevance and limitation of traditional economic theory. After the course, you should be able to reflect and recognize the strength but also some of the limitations of traditional economic theory and interpret some basic empirical evidence. You should also be able to critically assess political and economic discussions pertaining to the public sector.