Economics

This course is part of the LM degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrolment is by permission of the instructor. The objective of this course is to provide an advanced-level overview of the institutions, policies, and politics concerning economic governance in the European Union (EU). The course examines the process of European economic integration; the formulation, adoption, and implementation of the main economic policies in the EU, and the impact these policies have on member states. The course covers a variety of topics, including an overview of the institutions and policy processes in the EU economic governance; theories of European integration, and EU governance and political economy; Single Market and competition policy; Economic and Monetary Union; governing finance in the EU and internationally; the political economy of Brexit; the financial crisis, the sovereign debt crisis, and the EU response; and the EU's economic responses to the pandemic.

This course focuses on the dynamic implications of the links between the prevailing unprecedented global resource extraction and utilization; high input-high output industrial production, and resource scarcity. This allows one to conceive the relationships between the consequences of overexploitation of resources and irreversible material transformation in the production system, and their crucially important implications for resource efficiency and environmental efficiency.  

This course also seeks to guide students to make mental connections across disciplines with real life experiences based on comprehensive synthesis of evidence of the unsustainable resource consumption and sustainability practices in resource management. Here, it places great emphasis in developing critical thinking and analytical skills among students in identifying policy responses to the economic and environmental effects of overexploitation of natural resources.  

The foregoing takes the class to a broad-spectrum of debates relating to the properties of natural resources; the principles of resource efficiency; resource sustainability and environmental efficiency; environmental impacts of irreversible input-output resource conversions, and sustainable resource consumption and conservation, among other subjects of interest. 

This course covers key issues in energy and environmental economics from an economist’s perspective. Energy markets have become some of the most crucial and dynamic markets of the world economy, as they experienced a shift from heavy regulation to market-driven incentives. The course first looks at different energy sources such as crude oil, natural gas and coal. It then focuses on the crude oil market, highlighting how market power, optimal extraction, technological development and geopolitical risks are intertwined for price determination. The course also focuses on how changes in energy prices and uncertainties surrounding the price dynamics affect economic activity. Next, the course switches to environmental problems, and what types of policy tools can be employed to solve some of these problems. It discusses the economics for a broad range of possible policies: environmental taxes, subsidies, and cap-and-trade. In doing so, it discusses fundamental concepts in environmental economics, such as externalities and the challenge of designing multilateral agreements.

Prerequisite: Intermediate Macroeconomics Intermediate Microeconomics

This course covers European economic integration including definitions, connections, stages, and political integration. The impact of economic integration is reviewed, taking into consideration trade and financial integration, through empirical evidence of the integration process in Europe. Also discussed is the Divergence/Convergence debate. Students are given an overview of the Economic and Monetary Union in Europe including its involvement in the Impossible Trinity Principle and the Theory of Optimal Currency Areas. Finally, the course covers macroeconomic principles in the EMU which includes governance in the EMU, monetary policy in the time of crisis, fiscal policies in the EMU and the exchange rate policy for the Euro.

The course provides an overview of working in the United Kingdom and examines the changing organizational structures of work in Britain. It examines the social and economic changes that affect the workplace in the UK. Topics covered include the sociology of work; trade unions; oppression at work; generational changes at work. 

The main purpose of this course is to introduce the basic principles of financial derivative securities, so that students can rationally analyze and use them when they need to face complex derivatives. The course focusES on introducing the basic derivative securities, including product concepts such as futures, options, swaps, relevant pricing theory, and an analysis of the use of derivatives.

This course provides students with a framework for understanding modern ideas in the theory of international trade, and to use this framework to analyze the major policy issues of world trade. Students study the key concepts of positive and normative trade theory and leading examples of recent empirical work on the pattern of trade and the effects of protection and preferential trading agreements.