Course
Regulatory Reform in the US and EU
What is regulation? Who are the regulators and the regulatees? What are the public policy rationales for regulation of private enterprise and individual behavior? How are the regulations and regulatory systems in the USA and Europe similar and different? What is the future of regulation, given the forces of globalization and international trade? How can regulations and regulatory systems be reformed so that notions of efficiency and fairness are accomplished? What are the career paths for students in regulatory affairs?
Illustrative case studies will be used to examine how and why specific regulations were developed, and how well they performed in meeting the social objectives of efficiency and fairness.
This course is designed for management and policy majors with professional interests in the business sector, regulatory agencies and NGO’s. It will also be of interest to students thinking about enrolling in law school, business school, public policy school, environmental studies, or other forms of graduate study.
2011 Regulatory Reform Syllabus
Nation Building
What is the state, and how do states form? What functions do states perform for their citizens? How do state development and economic development interact? What impact do development aid, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and private investment have on the state building in current times? What is a “failed state” and can failed states turn around? These questions form the backbone to this course on nation building.
In the first section of the course, we will cover foundational theory of state-building, as well the difference between a “nation” and a “state” and how the distinction plays out in various regions on the globe with a focus on the developing world. Second, we will talk about the functions or roles that a state plays, examining each of five functions in detail. We will then cover the interplay between economic and state development in section three looking both at the theory behind them, and at the role of natural resources in helping or hindering development. In section four, we will examine the role that external actors – other governments, inter-governmental organizations, NGOs, and private companies – play in supporting or undermining state formation. Finally, we will examine more recent attempts at state building, looking at state failure and reconstruction, the role of ethnic conflict, and globalization.
2011 Nation Building Syllabus
Managing Hazards in Europe and the US
The purpose of this course is to examine how hazards are managed through a mixture of lectures, case studies, and classroom discussions. The program is offered in an educational context that invites comparison of how the United States and Europe cope with known or potential hazards to human health, safety and the environment. The intellectual style of the course will be interdisciplinary, with significant reliance on disciplinary contributions from environmental science, public health, public management, non-profit management, policy analysis, political science, economics, and law.
This is not a technical course in the methods of risk assessment or risk-benefit analysis. It is a management course. However, some of the lectures and case material will have significant scientific and quantitative content. Pre-course reading requirements include some background on the European Union and some background on risk analysis. There are no course prerequisites.
Objectives:
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Identify the major sources of information about risk, the analytical methods used to quantify risks, the circumstances that motivate use of one method as opposed to another.
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Distinguish risks that are uncertain from risks that are known yet variable in a population.
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Demonstrate an intuitive appreciation of probabilities, particularly in the case of low-probability, high-consequence events.
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Classify the different types of harm or damage that are commonly assessed in formal risk assessments.