ECO346 Foundations of Political Economy

[3–0, 3 cr.]

The course will address the fundamentals of political economy: production, exchange, value, and distribution. The course mainly is an exploration of the ideas of Adam Smith, Thomas Malthus, David Ricardo, Karl Marx and John Maynard Keynes. In addition, the marginalist theory will be studied within the context of the evolution of economic thought. The basic ideas of Veblen, Hayek and Schumpeter will also be briefly discussed. The course will draw lessons for the understanding of modern capitalism, in relation to issues such as technological change, market competition, wealth creation, income distribution, instability, long-run capitalist development, morality and class conflict.

Prerequisites: ECO201 Microeconomics and ECO202 Macroeconomics