Can "business success" be thought of as requiring a specific political form, such as liberal democracy?
It is often argued that ‘free markets’ lead to ‘free societies’ and so globalising business requires the opening up not only of markets but also of ‘closed’ political systems, so that political pluralism, plurality of consumer choice and firm competition go arm-in-arm. What if any grounds were there or – perhaps more urgently – are there for this belief?
The remarkable economic expansion of one-party China alongside rising protectionism elsewhere might look like proof that this connection – if it ever existed – has broken down. Is the current combination of economic expansion and political ‘closure’ an abnormality that will soon run out of steam and necessarily result in democratic revolutions in the ‘East’ and the dropping of trade barriers and the fall of populists in the ‘West’? Might a reflection on authoritarianism and capitalism in earlier periods (1920s-30s Europe, the South Korean ‘developmental state’, the Gulf monarchies, etc.) provide lessons to make sense of the fluctuating and volatile relations between business and democracy? What or who is sovereign today? States, eroded by cross-border capital flows? Consumers, whose every desire is mined and sold to advertisers? Increasingly alienated citizens? Where should we turn to grasp the complex forces mining the present?
Organisation of Module
This module involves a greater focus on close work in interactive seminars alongside lectures. In addition to the 10 lectures, there will be 2hr long seminars every 2 weeks. This means you will have more time to carry out tasks for the seminars, which means they will be much more student driven while also allowing for extensive feedback within the active seminars which should feel much more like workshops. I think that now that you are final semester third years, this mode of delivery will allow you to develop your own positions more effectively on the urgent questions we will be considering and will provide you with sustained and intensive support for your learning.
This is in order to allow a focus on theoretical work: work-shopping ideas, developing arguments and helping you towards an in-depth understanding of the issues and your own position, as well as confidence in expressing your developing ideas.
Assessment one worth 30%, will be a short (1000 word) solo-authored essay (or “position-paper”) that will be delivered in a "workshop" style event to your peers, over the length of one/two mornings or afternoons around week 10. I will chair a debate between you so you can confront your different positions, develop your critical thinking/public speaking skills and to refine your ideas. (You will also have to deliver hard copy of your paper to the module convenor in week 10). You will be asked to deliver an abstract of your argument by around week 6, for which you shall receive written feedback that you can use to revise and strengthen your is ideas.
Assessment two worth 70%, is a 2hr pre-seen exam, where you can put to work your developing standpoints (from assessment one) in the analysis of a concrete situation that dramatises the ways certain ways of viewing the relations between political and economic spheres are being undermined or are being transformed.
Aims:
The aim of the module, then, is to explore the history and possible futures of the scenarios that open up for you who are soon to make your way into an uncertain world with multiple threats and with categories that may no longer easily map our present let alone our future. The aim of the module, then,
1) is to encourage you to become aware of the substantial changes that economies, states and societies are undergoing in their fundamental principles:
While much is made of the impact of technological change on business and employment, there is little reflection on how some of these changes are affecting political forms, social organisation, or individuals and workers as subjects of rights (whether in terms of consumer, political or even human rights). Think for instance of how both democracy and business rely on ‘sovereign’ individuals, free to choose (political parties, or brands of goods) – and then think of the technologies and the businesses – such as Facebook or Google – that depend precisely on undermining that ‘sovereignty’ by selling your preferences to advertisers, thereby not only undermining the electoral process but also the “free-market” as the registering of individual preferences.
2) To note that the relation between economic structures and political forms is once again coming urgently to the fore:
After a long period where it was commonly assumed that such issues were quite distinct, increasingly the complex interweaving of these supposedly separate spheres cannot be ignored: e.g. it is visible in the possible retreat of globalisation alongside issues of bilateralism versus multilateralism, or of populism's claim to legitimacy against liberal "elitism"; of how securing supply chains is central to logistics firms and to state security agencies; think of the increasing role of the “dark money” behind Think Tanks through which corporate interests gain access to law-makers.
3) To grasp some of the different ways that the relation of the economy to the state, or business to politics have been theorised (and to be able to evaluate them), and the politics underpinning these accounts:
Laissez-faire, Keynesianism, ordoliberalism, neoliberalism, authoritarianism, populism, etc.
4) To trouble the link between capitalism and democracy:
Highlighting novel models of capitalism such as the South Korean Development State and the Chinese mixed economy; the way the Gulf Monarchies are inserted within international finance, etc.
Learning Outcomes:
By the end of the module, students should;
- be able to demonstrate an awareness of the changing organisation of firms, markets and states and their relations
- be able to examine different theoretical perspectives on state-economy relations
- be able to describe different political forms and their historico-geographical trajectories
- be able to evaluate the social and political impact of technological and disciplinary innovations
- have developed problem solving and analytical skills
- be able to research specific problems and outline their solutions
- be able to apply theory to concrete situations
- be able to articulate and advance arguments
Feedback:
You will be given feedback throughout the module. The module organiser will give you a variety of responses, comments, advice and suggestions of on your contributions in class (such as your own questions, answers to questions, contributions to discussion, and your presentations in class). The purpose of this feedback, which is given orally, is to enable you to improve your learning, to help you to identify your strengths and weaknesses and to work on them. We call this “formative” feedback, and we regard it as a very important part of the teaching and learning process.
Bear in mind too that the responses you receive from your fellow students in class when they hear your presentations or your contributions in discussion can also be useful peer feedback of this formative kind. Peer feedback is often most useful, not always so much about the substantive merits of your arguments and evidence (except where a fellow student has particular expertise, typically in knowledge about an empirical topic, the module organiser's advice may be more valuable to you in this respect) but instead your fellow students' responses to you will often provide you with valuable feedback on how clearly you express your arguments and how well you convey your evidence.
If you ask to see the module organiser during office hours, you can ask for more of this kind of feedback on any aspect of your learning.
In addition, we provide you with written feedback in the form of comments on your assignments and where applicable on your seminar presentation and handling of questions afterward in the seminar. The purpose of this feedback is to explain the mark that has been given, to explain how your work met or fell short of the standards we expect. Because you will receive this feedback after classes or assessed presentation for the module have concluded, and because it provides you with a summary of what you have achieved by that concluding stage, we call this “summative” feedback. However, it will be useful for you as you prepare for the next semester's modules or for your work on your dissertation.
