87167 - INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS

Learning outcomes

The aim of the course is to offer students an overview of the current main issues in international development economics, from both the analytical and the applied viewpoints, with a targeted focus on their policy implications. With the objective of providing the basic context for correctly framing the Sustainable Development Goals, the course focuses on issues such as: poverty and hunger, inequality within and across countries, internal and international migration and climate change. The course looks, in a comparative way, at the experiences in advanced, emerging and developing economies. At the end of the course, students should be able to acquire the ability to grasp the relevant problems of economic development in an applied and comparative perspective, with thematic in-depth applications.

Course contents

This course covers three main areas:

1. Poverty – how has poverty evolved in recent times and how it has affected (and been affected) by development (or lack of)
2. Inequality - how has inequality evolved in recent times and how it has affected (and been affected) by development (or lack of)
3. Climate change – how has climate change evolved in recent times and how it has affected (and has been affected) by development

Poverty

1. What is poverty: definitions and measures. Absolute and relative poverty. Multi-dimensional poverty

2. Poverty: what the numbers show. Long-run and short run tendencies. The changing “geography of poverty”

Inequality

1. Inequality in the distribution of income and wealth: definitions and concepts

2. Inequality in the distribution of income and wealth: measures

3. The relationship between income growth and income inequality. The Kuznets’ curve.

4. World income inequality: the distance between rich and poor countries. The great divergence.

5. Is world income inequality increasing or not? The evidence

6. Historical view on inequality in the distribution of wealth and income. Piketty’s contribution. The debate on Piketty’s contribution

7. Inequality in health and living conditions

8. The consequences of inequality: populism and the crisis of democracy

Climate change and its economic and social consequences

1. Why are we talking about climate change. Who (which country/activity) is mostly contributing to it and who (which country/activity) is mostly affected

2. Climate change inequalities

3. Climate change and economics - Climate change and policy

4. Consequences of climate change on social and economic conditions

5. The social and economic effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and other environmental tragedies

Readings/Bibliography

To be suggested during the course

Teaching methods

Live lectures in class.

Assessment methods

60% of final grade: a written 6-question 2-hour exam.

40% of final grade: a written essay on a free topic

Office hours

See the website of Pier Giorgio Ardeni