Online, part-time

Global Political Economy MA

Following the long tail of the global financial and economic crisis of 2007-2008, globalisation is increasingly targeted as part of the problem by supposedly anti-established figures of all political stripes. This resulting backlash has, according to many observers, resulted in de-globalisation, not only with respect to patterns in trade and investment, but also in policy terms, with a return to protectionist measures, including in the form of trade wars.

Against this backdrop, this module focuses particularly on different approaches and theories for understanding the global political economy. It will equip you with key analytical tools to make sense of contemporary transformations, which will be explored in the follow-up module connected to this one, Issues in Global Political Economy.

More specifically, the module is organised in three parts. Firstly, it focuses on approaches that precede the emergence of a global political economy, but still provide tools and insights relevant for its functioning today. Secondly, it zooms in on dominant approaches from International Political Economy (IPE), the field most directly concerned with the global political economy.

Finally, the module will also help you assess the value of heterodox and critical approaches to the study of the global political economy, including most notably Marxist, neo-Gramscian, and feminist scholarship.

This module is the follow-up to Global Political Economy: Theories & Approaches. It centres globalisation as a material process that has fundamentally reshaped the international political economy that emerged after World War Two into the global system we live in today.

The module is organised in three main parts. The first focuses on financial globalisation, with a particular emphasis on the consequence of the collapse of the Bretton Woods exchange rate arrangement and on the global financial crisis of 2007-8 and its long aftermath.

The second part instead focuses on the globalisation of production, looking at how transformations in the international trade regime have facilitated the emergence and spread of global value chains.

The final part of the module examines global challenges that might not immediately seem related to the global political economy but are in fact deeply affected by it. They range from the climate crisis to the implications of international migration to the prospects of addressing poverty and inequality.

This module provides you with the foundations you’ll need to conduct high-quality independent research in the social sciences generally, and more specifically when investigating topics pertaining to the global political economy.

The content is designed to guide you through three stages of research: (i) design and planning; (ii) data collection; (iii) data analysis. You’ll also be expected to collaborate with other students, including, for instance, by providing peer-feedback on respective research ideas and working together to develop a prospective research project’s design. 

Who gets to 'know' the global economy and who are deemed its objects for improvement? This module seeks to broaden the study of power in the global economy that accounts for the legacies of imperialism and colonialism that historically foreclosed non-Western ways of knowing.

It'll equip you with tools to analytically engage with the current global order: one marked by geopolitical instability, political upheaval, economic uncertainty, and the existential threats posed by climate change and pandemics. 

To achieve this, you're introduced to key literatures developed by political economists of the Global South: scholars of the black radical tradition, intersectional feminists, indigenous, ecological and other related critics.

Throughout the module, we aim to expand and complicate the understanding of European development as a global actor and institutional model. We do this by examining the impacts of empire, slavery, indentureship, and race in order to offer contemporary analysis of production, finance, development, climate change and the sustained racialised and gendered inequalities.

The module will provide you with political economy analyses that foster more global conversations, paying greater attention to spaces and communities beyond Europe and North America. This approach invites new decolonial framings to address the challenges of the contemporary global economy and explores how these neo-imperial logics are confronted and resisted.

This module offers novel answers to the big questions of migration and dismantles its main myths. Who are the migrants? Do border controls increase security? Do migrants steal our jobs? Can we help migrants at their home? Are open borders desirable? These are just some of the issues addressed by Professor Leila Simona Talani, drawing on her extensive research on migration. 

Starting from the assessment of the impact of globalisation on international migration, the module asserts, on the basis of extensive empirical research, that it’s virtually impossible to stop contemporary migratory flows from the global South to the global North.

As a consequence, policies designed to control, limit or deter migration at the border only result in the transformation of part or all regular migrants into irregular ones.  

This, in turn, leads to an overall increase of insecurity for both citizens and migrants. This is as a result of the involvement of organised crime in the smuggling and trafficking of human beings, the employment of migrants in the underground (or illegal) economy of receiving countries, the enhanced incentives for migrants to adopt deviant behaviours, and their increased criminalisation by the local population and institutions. These issues will all be analysed and assessed in this module. 

This module provides you with the opportunity to reflect systematically on the independent research on a topic of your own choosing required for completing your final dissertation.

The dissertation represents your main opportunity to undertake a distinctive, individual piece of in-depth academic research that showcases what you learned during this programme. It can also be shown to potential employers as evidence of your ability to work independently and produce high-quality research.

The module covers the key stages of the dissertation process, including formulating the research question, conducting the literature review, navigating the relationship with your academic supervisor, writing your thesis, and revising and completing your submission.