In recent decades, the notion of “policy network” and the method of social network analysis have attracted considerable interest from the public policy community. While ordinary statistical methods analyze attributes of actors (such as income, education, voting behavior etc.) and treat actors as independent from each other, social network analysis is focused on relations between different actors (e.g. cooperation, conflict, resource flows) and treats actors as interdependent. The aim of this course is threefold: First, to discuss some basic sociometric tools useful for the analysis of relations between different actors. Second, to study existing analyses of relational data from various disciplines. Third and most importantly, to learn how the method can be applied. Therefore, students are invited to use examples from their own fields of interest. The course will follow the format of an intensive block course with a strong research component.
The course will concentrate on the various forms of international trade relations and their political and economic consequences. After an introduction in the the emergence and functioning of the WTO, the course will discuss the causes of ever growing bilateral and regional trade agreements. The following sessions will analyse the stability of the global trade order, the effect of trade arrangements on growth, investment, development and inequality. The seminar will also analyse the consequence of globalised trade relations for democracy, governance structures and industrial relations. Several sessions will be research oriented by focussing on regions such as the transatlantic, Latin America, Africa and South-east Asia.
This course focuses on the development of innovation and management of higher education. Grounded in the history of the modern university (since 1800), and using contemporary and case study evidence, it places reform efforts in the context of managing universities amidst conflicting priorities and competing stakeholders. It examines how and why innovations emerge, the ways they are (and are not) implemented, and the role of traditional academic governance vs. management in this process. It is particularly concerned with the evolving role of students, services to students, and growing attention to ‘the student experience’—looking at efforts to expand access to more—and more diverse—students, improving learning environments, and developing strategies for implementing and managing student-oriented reforms.
This Adcanced Topics seminar gives an overview over different approaches to explaining success or failure in public policy reforms. It deals with a diverse set of theoretical approaches ranging from rational choice and institutional approaches to problems of framing and perception of reforms. Case studies will cover a broad spectrum of policy areas such as welfare state, fiscal policy and international institutions.
This Advanced Topic seminar provides an in-depth understanding of how public policy shapes
the arrangements, terms and conditions under which labor markets interact
with various population processes. Current theoretical and policy approaches
to labor market institutions and active labor market policies, social
security and pensions, aging and retirement, education and training,
migration, integration and discrimination, and fertility and family will be
thoroughly studied.
The main aim of this course is to familiarize students with how the abstract principle of equality is turned into policy and practice in Europe and beyond. Starting from what equality means as a basic legal principle and right in modern democratic systems, the course moves on to present and critically analyze the policy visions, policy approaches and policy tools used to put equality into practice.The literature to which the course refers is interdisciplinary in nature with some texts of political philosophy, and legal theory, but mainly political science and policy theory writings. The course looks at all grounds of inequality but especially at race and ethnicity, gender and disability, and devote special attention to the intersection between different inequality axes. It focuses primarily on policy practice in Europe and North America.
This is an advanced level course on law and policy-making in the European Union. The course adopts an interdisciplinary approach, with a particular focus on political sciences, IR and legal perspectives, but including readings and lecturers from scholars from other disciplines (economics, sociology, history). The course focuses on the main decision and law-making institutions and processes, and highlights key challenges of EU governance. Part A concentrates on historical, theoretical and institutional dimensions, Part B explores law- and decision-making mechanisms within the context of specific policy areas or issues (e.g. single market, social policy, environment, citizenship, etc.), and Part C addresses current issues and challenges of European construction (e.g. enlargement, Treaty of Lisbon).
This course is aimed at post-graduate students (MA/PhD) with a specialised interest in EU economic and social policy who already have a knowledge of EU policy-making in general and/or in other policy areas - both at an empirical and theoretical level. The course provides access to core policies and governance mechanisms in the field of EU socio-economic governance. It combines insights into fundamental and historical developments – such as the development of freedom of movement for labour in the context of the single market or the establishment of Economic and Monetary Union – with a review of contemporary policies choices – such as within the context of the Stability and Growth Pact and the Lisbon process. The course aims at engaging students with core theories and research perspectives which have been applied to EU socio-economic governance with a view of developing core analytical skills required for independent post-graduate research in this policy field.
Europe is an old cultural idea but culture is a relatively recent prerogative of the EU, introduced in the Maastricht Treaty (1992). This course will explore the cultural facets of the European integration process, from indirect regulation to cultural actions and programs and more recent ambitions to articulate a transversal European cultural policy. The course is primarily aimed at the students of public policy but will be of interest to students in European studies and international relations, sociology, political science, economy, cultural and legal studies.
Intended for novices in cultural policy studies as part of public policy, the course will interest students in sociology, cultural and medieval studies, and political science. The aim is to make the students familiar with key cultural policy notions and concepts, functions and rationales, esp. with those issues that are much debated among culture professionals, politicians, civil servants and researchers, such as decentralization, privatization, institutional modernization, cultural diversity, artistic mobility... Although specific dynamics of post-communist transition in Central and Eastern Europe and its impact of cultural systems will be handled, the emphasis is on the emergence of a comprehensive European cultural policy agenda, on municipal, regional, national and transnational level, under the impact of globalization, migration and digitalization.
