Development Studies

In 2015, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development set out 17 Sustainable Development Goals which provide a roadmap for addressing the key global challenges that the world is facing including, poverty, inequality, climate, environmental degradation, peace, and justice. In this course, students are introduced to the SDGs, the practical ways in which policy aims to address them, and how the success of these policies in progressing the Goals can be measured and evaluated. 

This course explores key development challenges faced across developing countries and is divided into three sections. The first critically examines some of the major concepts, paradigms, and theories, which have attempted to define what development is, how and why it occurs (or does not), and to whose benefit. The second focuses on some of the key development challenges faced by developing countries: economic (poverty, inequality, unemployment), political (democracy, human rights, role of elites), social (religion, race/ethnicity/caste, urbanization), and natural (climate change, pollution, resource extraction, extermination of species). The final section explores possible remedies to these issues through international cooperation (trade, aid, finance, South-South cooperation), national policies (welfare schemes, laws and regulations), and micro and informal solutions. 
 

This course examines challenges posed by poverty affecting a billion people in low-income countries across the world as targeted by the Sustainable Development Goals and taking an economic approach to conceptualizing those challenges, their causes, and solutions. The course provides theoretical frameworks to understand, measure, analyze, and discuss themes within the development economics literature focusing on poverty, its consequences, and its alleviation. Key questions discussed during the course include: What is the state of progress towards relevant SDGs? What is life like when living with under a dollar a day? Are famines unavoidable? Is child labor necessary? Is education and health key to lifting people out of poverty? Does growth help the poorest of the poor? And, does aid matter for development? What is the relationship between environment and development, and how does climate change affect them? What role do sustainable food systems play in addressing both climate change and food insecurity? The course includes the following thematic topics: poverty and inequality; economic growth and development; health and education; agricultural transformation; aid; poverty, conflicts, and corruption; environment and development; sustainable food systems. 

The course covers a wide range of themes representative of contemporary issues in development economics. It considers what are the developing worlds and what are the major development strategies. It also covers development policies: the roles of the market, the state and civil society; agricultural transformation and specific problems in rural areas; population growth and development; work and informality; urbanization: dynamics, issues, problems; environment and development; poverty and inequality; human capital, human development and growth; development aid; natural resources; violence and crime: dynamics, issues, and explanatory models; democracy and development.

This course develops students' knowledge of the key microeconomic issues facing developing economies, and deepens their familiarity with modern analytical and empirical approaches to development economics with an emphasis on the most recent advances in the field. Students also learn about the use of formal microeconomic modelling in development, the links between formal models and empirics, and the seminal debates in development. Students must have taken a microeconomics course prior to enrollment.

This course examines how international factors influence the economic policies of developing countries. Students evaluate different theoretical debates, with an emphasis on how cross-border flows – such as goods, capital, production, people, and pollution – influence economic policymaking in developing regions. They address several themes that are central to understanding the politics of economic policymaking in emerging economies, including, the legacies of colonialism, trade protectionism and liberalization, globalization and the race to the bottom, the role of the state in development, and the influence of international organizations on developing countries.

This is a special studies course involving an internship with a corporate, public, governmental, or private organization, arranged with the Study Center Director or Liaison Officer. Specific internships vary each term and are described on a special study project form for each student. A substantial paper or series of reports is required. Units vary depending on the contact hours and method of assessment. The internship may be taken during one or more terms but the units cannot exceed a total of 12.0 for the year.

This course examines the causes and correlates of global poverty, and investigates the policies used to address it. The approach of the course is microeconomic, meaning that it focuses on individual and household behaviors, as well as market failures which lead to sub-optimal choices by these individuals. It covers measurement of poverty and inequality, the role of health and education in poverty, problems in credit, savings, and insurance markets, the causes and effects of migration, environmental degradation, and child labor. 

This course offers interpretations of current (and past) development processes and patterns, specifically in relation to Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Taking into account a range of overlapping dimensions (from social, economic, cultural, and political to institutional), the course explores the multifaceted and layered nature of development and its variegated impacts on the ground. Thus, the course adopts a geographical lens to unpack various economic and societal shifts taking place in developing and emerging countries. Questions addressed in the course include what are the main dimensions of development in the so-called global South? What are the primary drivers of change? What opportunities and barriers exist? What are the main strategies to induce development? What coping strategies are employed? Central to this course is the critical reflection on, and recognition of the multiple meanings of, development and its manifold local expressions within an interconnected world. Entry Requirements: Introduction to Human Geography.