Learning outcomes

The Ghost of Capitalism

The course aims to focus on those historical facts and theories which attest a progressive decline of institutions and economic policies inspired by the traditional sight of capitalism both as competitive market ruled by the law and as the most efficient mean to pursue collective interests.
The course is shaped on two main approaches:
1. the development of economic theory since the death of John Maynard Keynes until Paul Krugman’s International Economics;
2. A sketch on economic development in leading countries since the post-war era to 2010.
This double approach rests on the idea that economic theories and economic facts are not separable and that there is no critical understanding of economic processes without historical comparison. Students are expected to attend and participate in lectures.

Program

First Part:
Economic Development in USA, England, France, Germany, Soviet Union, Japan, China and India
Main Capital theories
Schumpeter’s theory and the end of Capitalism
Corporatism and Neo-corporatism in Europe and the Americas
The role of European Institutions and the free market
Financial and monetary issues between 1970 and 2007
The case of Italy. Extraordinary or paradigmatic?
The Scandinavian countries model
Growth factors and managed economy
Trade Unions, unemployment and salaries
Privatization and liberalization processes in Europe and Asia
Research, Investments and Profit in european companies

Second Part:
Contemporary economic development in various areas of the world (US, South-Eastern Asia, Latin America and Continental Europe). In particular, it will be discussed how different types of capitalism affected the firms, the technological innovation and the financial system in a context of growing globalization.

Examination Methods

Examination will be both written and oral.
Witten examination consists in a test within the e-learning platform, based on 15 questions.
Participation is warmly encouraged not only as physical attendance to the lectures but much more as an active presence, raising issues and discussing some of the topics of the course in the e-learning forum.

Slides and papers presented during the course are only for students who are able to prove of attending at least 80% of the classes.
No attending students are pleased to take contact with Course Coordinator (elefante@univr.it) for program.


Textbooks Information:

Daran Acemoglu - James A. Robinson, Why Nations fail. The Origins of Power, Prosperity and Poverty, Crown Publishers.
D. Cohen, The Prosperity of Vice: A Worried View of Economics, MIT Press 2012., New York, 2012.
Barry C. Lynn, Cornered. The New Monopoly Capitalism and the Economics of Destruction, John Wiley & Sons, Inc, Hoboken NJ, 2010.
John Mackey - Raj Sisodia, Liberating the Heroic spirit of conscious capitalism, Harvard Business Review Press, Boston, 2013.
Jeff Madrick, Age of Greed, The Triumph of Finance and the Decline of America. 1970 to present, Alfred A. Knopf, New York 2011.
Deirdre McCloskey, The Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for an Age of Commerce, University of Chicago Press, Chicago 2007.
Philippe Schmitter, Democratic Theory and Neocorporatist Practice, «Social Research», vol. 50, n.4 (winter 1983), pp. 885-928.
Wolfgang Streeck, How to study Contemporary Capitalism?, «European Journal of Sociology», n. 53, 1-2012, pp. 1-28.
Luigi Zingales, A Capitalism for the People. Recapturing the lost genius of American Prosperity, Basic Books, New York, 2012.
Further readings will be offered during the course for attending students.


Reading for non-attending students only:
North, Douglass C. - Wallis, John Joseph - Weingast, Barry R.. Violence and Social Orders: a Conceptual Framework for Interpreting Recorded Human History, New York, NY Cambridge university press, 2009.
Baumol, William J - Litan, Robert E. - Schramm, Carl J. Good Capitalism, Bad Capitalism, and the Economics of Growth and Prosperity, New Haven Yale university press, 2007.
Amatori, Franco, Chandler, Alfred D, Hikino, Takashi. Big Business and the Wealth of Nations Cambridge Cambridge university press, 1997.