International Political Economy
Instructor, Wesleyan University,2025
This course examines the political consequences of and responses to international economic exchange between countries with an emphasis on whether climate change changes this political behavior. In particular, we will look at how domestic actors, such as voters, firms, and associations, respond to and try to shape government action on issues such as trade, international finance, migration and foreign direct investment. Rather than consider climate change and its policy as a separate domain, this course will focus on the interaction between the climate and other policy areas in international political economy (IPE). In doing so, we will consider topics such as trade or migration with and without climate policy considerations to understand policy dynamics in a warming world. For example, in a similar vein to traditional trade policy, do carbon intensive producers favor carbon tariffs to protect themselves from uneven climate regulation cross-nationally or the removal of domestic carbon regulations? The objective of this course, therefore, is to provide students with a solid grounding of the relationship between domestic politics and globalization and then consider whether climate change alters these relationships. (Syllabus available upon request)