London School of Economics

This course builds on the knowledge acquired in Macroeconomics I (EC1B5). Students use macroeconomic analysis to explore important contemporary questions and special emphasis is given to how public policy can change economic outcomes. Students learn how to understand economic problems by focusing on the key characteristics, choosing the relevant mechanisms and developing a solid intuition. The use of mathematics is minimal (in particular, with no calculus) and the emphasis of instruction is on graphical analysis and economic intuition. Precise topics and readings are announced and are selected to be of current interest.

Data science has unlocked exciting possibilities for social scientists through its diverse toolkit, including big data analysis, visualisation, and machine learning models, enabling them to extract valuable insights from their data.  Yet, the success of a data-driven project hinges on data quality. This is where data engineering plays a pivotal role. Professionals must ensure that their acquired data is sufficient and accurate and must be adaptable to handle 'messy data' effectively. A substantial portion of time in data-driven projects (anecdotally 80%) is dedicated to cleaning and pre-processing data, with only 20% said to be devoted to building, evaluating, and deploying machine learning models. Despite the emergence of new AI technologies, which promise to automate many coding tasks, data manipulation is likely to remain an indispensable skill due to the inherent messiness of real-world data. By the end of this course, students will be proficient in producing a website to communicate your collected data and showcase your newly acquired data-wrangling abilities.

How do social divisions and differences shape our identities, actions, and life-chances? This course provides an introduction to key debates in contemporary sociology, examining the forces that drive social stratification and the construction of social identity. In this course, students gain a critical understanding of current research and analysis in the study of social inequalities around class, race, and gender, exploring how sociology helps us to address topical real-world issues. The course centers on the ways in which power relations, patterns of social stratification and inequality, and diverse identities are shaped in contemporary societies – focusing on structural divisions, social movements, and everyday experiences and identities in different international contexts.

This course helps students develop the relevant knowledge and understanding of fixed income instruments and interest rate models. The course provides an overview of the major institutions, organizations, and investors, and it covers both the theoretical background of fixed income markets and its practical implementation. Gaining hands-on experience using real-world examples, students develop the critical thinking and analytical skills to engage in fixed income markets globally.

The course explores food as the essential link between nature and culture, examining how food classification, production, cooking, and eating shape cultural identity, social organization, family and gender systems, and religious practices. By studying practices of commensality, students uncover how food reveals ideas about similarity, difference, politics, religion, and social hierarchies. Students also explore contemporary issues such as how food consumption ties to identity, the obesity epidemic, and the environmental challenges of sustainable food production.