Module details for Work, Class and the Global Economy

Description

This module examines key economic and social processes from a critical sociological perspective.

Aims

The aims of this module are to facilitate critical student engagement with key socio- political themes linked to the development of the global economy through a focus on the complex interrelationships between contemporary labour processes, consumption, markets, financial systems and class struggles.

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this module the student should be able to:

1.  Demonstrate a critical understanding of the concepts of labour, class and global economy.

2.  Challenge and contest conventional hegemonic accounts of globalization and economic development.

3.  Trace out, compare and contrast the complex, inner connections between social and economic phenomena.

4.  Understand critically the human content, experience and social constitution of globalization and neoliberalism.

Indicative Content

1 Work

Work in classical and contemporary social theory, work or labour, the ontology of labour, abstract and concrete labour, intellectual and manual labour, the accumulation of labour and the degradation of women, unemployment and the refusal of work.

2 Class

The sociological approaches to class from Adam Smith to Max Weber; class and the stratification of British society; class as a critical concept; class, social constitution and the logic of separation.

3 Global Economy

Globalization and critical political economy, Fordism and Post-Fordism, the rise and fall of Keynesianism, Neo-liberalism, the politics of money and the expansion of credit, global capital and crisis.

Teaching and Learning Work Loads