2023/2024
Неравенство и всеобщее благосостояние государств в международной перспективе
Статус:
Маго-лего
Кто читает:
Департамент мировой экономики
Когда читается:
3, 4 модуль
Охват аудитории:
для своего кампуса
Преподаватели:
Синявская Оксана Вячеславовна
Язык:
английский
Кредиты:
6
Контактные часы:
48
Course Syllabus
Abstract
This course offers an introduction to inequality and welfare states in an international perspective. How does social stratification and inequalities influence welfare state development? To what extent and in which way do different welfare state lessen, reproduce or heighten social inequalities? This course aims to address these questions from sociological and political economy perspectives. The course starts from an overview of different dimensions of inequality and factors contributing to its growth in the last decades. Then we turn to the issue of the diversity of welfare states in different regions and countries and their distributional outcomes. The last part of the course focuses on the current demographic, social, technological and economic challenges to welfare states and welfare states adaptation and transformation.
Learning Objectives
- This course aims to: - make the students familiar with the debates about poverty, economic and social inequalities, social stratification, accumulated inequalities and the corresponding social and public policies and other forms of social protection; - discuss how we can classify and analyze different welfare states in a comparative way, and how we can measure and explain welfare state change; - give an overview of research and policy debates about “digital poverty”, “digital divide”, and “new social risks”; - review and critically discuss various exogenous and endogenous pressures on the welfare states in the 21st century; - make the students familiar with the different theoretical approaches to explain patterns of welfare state transformation, adaptation and social policy reforms; - enable participants to critically discuss key questions concerning the functioning and development of welfare states in different countries thus enabling them to develop their own perspectives and contribute to current public debates about welfare provisioning.
Expected Learning Outcomes
- Become familiar with the basic terms used in debates around well-being, inequality and social policy
- Can explain the relationship between poverty, inequality and economic development
- Become familiar with and can correctly apply the terms used in debates around social stratification, and social inequalities
- Problematize and present conclusions as well as arguments orally and in a written form according to academic principles
- Become familiar with Issues of measurement and how these impact on policy formulation and evaluation, can measure poverty, economic inequality
- Become familiar with and can correctly apply the terms used in debates around life course inequality
- Become familiar with the main approaches to classification and analysis of different welfare states in a comparative way, and ways of measurement and explanation of welfare state change
- Acquire practical skills of analytical work on the study of social processes, and the comparative analysis of models of social policy
- Can explain the implications of social policies for the distribution and quality of social and economic security and hence for the poverty and inequality dynamics
- Be able to demonstrate a clear grasp of contemporary debates on the key social policy challenges in countries with different levels of development and have a deeper understanding of the socio-political, institutional, economic and demographic factors that influence the formation and the dynamics of different welfare regimes
- Become familiar with research and policy debates about population ageing, gender revolution, migration, and “new social risks”
- Become familiar with research and policy debates about “digital poverty”, “digital divide”, and “techno-poverty”
- Become familiar with the different theoretical approaches to explain patterns of welfare state transformation, adaptation and social policy reforms
Course Contents
- Introduction to the course and overview
- Poverty and Economic Inequality
- Social inequalities
- Life course inequality
- Is ‘welfare state’ a Western concept and phenomenon? Welfare state typologies: established and emerging welfare states
- Modern welfare states regimes: Western countries and former socialist countries (CEEs, post-soviet states)
- Modern welfare states regimes: Latin America and Asia
- Welfare state outcomes, poverty, inequality, and redistribution
- Challenges to welfare states: changes in demographic behavior, population ageing and migration
- Challenges to welfare states: technological revolutions, post-industrial development, globalization
- Challenges to welfare states: crises, neoliberal shift, public attitudes
- Welfare states resilience and changes. Outlook
Assessment Elements
- QuizКороткий письменный учебный тест, выполняемый по результатам прохождения нескольких тем: разделы 1-4; разделы 5-8; разделы 9-11
- Reading ReflectionКраткое изложение основных моментов прочитанного материала. During the course students are expected to read a lot of academic literature on the topics of the course. Starting from the second week of this course, every student is expected to submit a total of two reading summaries throughout the course. A student can choose the readings they are willing to summa-rize but they must complete at least one reflection to be graded. The reflection is a one-page (single-spaced) maximum written summary of the reading assignment. It must be submitted by email 24 hours before the class. The reflection should outline the main arguments of the readings, insights into the reading, and pro-vide two questions for discussion during the class. The class discussion will start with the student’s summary.
- Class attendance and participationSince this course only takes place once a week, attendance is serious for successful mastery of the course material. Attendance will be taken at each class.
- Media assignmentStudents are expected to find 2 publications in mass media related to the course topics and to critically assess it (1-2 pages maximum)
- PresentationA group of students (2-3) will give a short presentation in-class in a fourth module. Each presentation will last 15 minutes and should be based on the research conducted by students during the course. In this presentation, students will outline the evolution of a welfare state / social policies in a country of their choice and will make predictions about how the particular welfare state in question will respond to crises of economics and changing demographics, using basic concepts of political economy. More details will be provided in class in the first week of the course
- Policy memo
- ExamFinal examination is in the form of a written test
Interim Assessment
- 2023/2024 4th module0.025 * Class attendance and participation + 0.025 * Class attendance and participation + 0.3 * Exam + 0.05 * Media assignment + 0.05 * Media assignment + 0.05 * Policy memo + 0.25 * Presentation + 0.05 * Quiz + 0.1 * Quiz + 0.05 * Reading Reflection + 0.05 * Reading Reflection
Bibliography
Recommended Core Bibliography
- Social stratification : class, race, and gender in sociological perspective, , 2001
- Social stratification : class, race, and gender in sociological perspective, , 2008
- Social stratification : class, race, and gender in sociological perspective, , 2014
- The Blackwell companion to social inequalities, , 2005
- The Oxford handbook of economic inequality, , 2009
- The Oxford handbook of the welfare state, , 2010
- The Routledge handbook of the welfare state, , 2013
Recommended Additional Bibliography
- Age studies : a sociological examination of how we age and are aged through the life course, Pickard, S., 2016
- Capital in the twenty-first century, Piketty, T., 2014
- Changing welfare states, Hemerijck, A., 2013
- Democratization and welfare state development in Taiwan, Aspalter, C., 2002
- Development, democracy and welfare states : Latin America, East Asia, and Eastern Europe, Haggard, S., 2008
- Global capital, political institutions, and policy change in developed welfare states, Swank, D., 2002
- Global inequality : a new approach for the age of globalization, Milanovic, B., 2016
- Handbook on social stratification in the BRIC countries : change and perspective, , 2013
- Inequality : what can be done?, Atkinson, A. B., 2015
- Making a European welfare state? : convergences and conflicts over European social policy, , 2004
- Modern welfare states : politics and policies in Social Democratic Scandinavia, Einhorn, E. S., 1989
- New welfare states in East Asia : global challenges and restructuring, , 2011
- Population ageing - a threat to the welfare state? : the case of Sweden, , 2010
- Post-communist welfare states in European context : patterns of welfare policies in Central and Eastern Europe, Kuitto, K., 2016
- Radical welfare state retrenchment : a comparative analysis, Starke, P., 2008
- Reforming European welfare states : Germany and the United Kingdom compared, Clasen, J., 2005
- Reframing social citizenship, Taylor-Gooby, P., 2010
- Social foundations of postindustrial economies, Esping-Andersen, G., 2000