Prerequisite: None

Exam Type: No Exam
Paper only.

This seminar will explore the relationship between corruption and inequality, examining whether the may create a vicious cycle. We will engage with influential scholars of institutionalism to understand how the lines between public and private have blurred in the current political environment in the United States and abroad as a historical process. We will analyze prominent theories of legal, institutional and economic development aimed at reducing economic inequality and fighting corruption in various countries and historical periods.

In the first part of the course, we will study three models of welfare state development. We will begin with the rise of institutional economics and legal realism in the United States as a response to the increase in economic inequality caused by the Great Depression. We will then examine the European approach through the development of the Swedish economic, which epitomizes the European welfare state. Finally, we will examine the development of the Asian Tigers and the “flying geese” theory, according to which other Asian countries would emulate Japan’s post-war model. In the second part of the course, we will analyze the swing of the pendulum towards deregulation that characterized the neoliberal period, focusing on intellectual moves like transaction cost analysis, information theory and capture theory that deprioritized concerns with economic inequality. We will also explore current developments to determine if new institutional arrangements are emerging, potentially replacing the public-private division that has characterized liberal societies in the last two centuries, or if we are witnessing a resurgence of older economic and political regimes. The course aims to inspire students to conduct research addressing the most significant problems of contemporary societies by reading authors that had a transformational impact in times of crises.

Cross-registrants are encouraged to apply.