MBA and Sloan Elective Courses: Political Economy
POLECON 230. Nonmarket Strategy
This course addresses managerial issues in the social, political, and legal environments of business. Cases and readings emphasize strategies to improve the performance of companies in light of their multiple constituencies. Cases are set in both international and U.S. environments. Topics include integrated strategy, activists and the media, legislation affecting business, regulation and antitrust, intellectual property, and international trade policy.
POLECON 232. Law and Economics for Corporate Strategy
This course introduces students to the core issues of law and economics and their applications to managerial strategy. Markets and the legal environment are increasingly interrelated: issues such as antitrust, intellectual property, privacy rights, product regulation, and torts affect firms' profitability both directly through legal action and indirectly by determining the "rules of the game." Nor are companies simply reactive to legal and political forces; actions taken by managers in firms often propel issues before the public eye. For instance, electronic collection and collation of personal data has stimulated new concerns about privacy, while court decisions, new legislation, and public opinion have all played roles in determining what is acceptable. Such legal and political forces invariably necessitate changes in corporate strategy, and the effectiveness of corporate strategy often rests on managers' ability to anticipate, rather than simply react to, developments in the nonmarket environment. The course also considers other important nonmarket issues, such as responding to pressure from independent interest groups and understanding how firms may influence legislative and executive political processes.
POLECON 235. Ethics
An important component of responsible management is how a company's managers deal with ethical issues. The three principal objectives of this course are to consider an important set of ethics systems, increase the precision with which students think about, discuss and practice ethics, and provide opportunities to apply ethics systems to business problems. The approach taken to ethics is based on moral principles, and the focus is on systems that provide foundations for ethical intuitions pertaining to well-being, rights and justice. Not taught in 2009-10.
POLECON 332. Managers and the Legal Environment
To excel, managers and entrepreneurs must know how to operate successfully in the legal environment in which they must conduct business. This course addresses the legal aspects of business agreements and relationships. The course begins with an overview of the different forms of business organizations available, mergers and acquisitions, public and private offerings of securities, and the fiduciary duties of officers, directors and controlling shareholders. The course covers the US court system and the laws of contracts, torts, antitrust and intellectual property. The legal aspects of the employment relationship as they relate to the liability of corporations and managers for the acts of their employees, wrongful termination, discrimination, and sexual harassment will also be covered. Not taught in 2009-10.
POLECON 347. Intellectual Property and Its Effect on Business
This course explores the impact intellectual property rights have on business decisions. It begins with a general background of intellectual property law including copyright, trademark, patent and trade secret. It will also cover quasi property rights such as database and privacy. Each of these distinct rights will be examined through a case methodology affording students an opportunity to gauge the relative strengths and weaknesses of a particular form of protection. As the value of intellectual property rises, the avenues of economic return increase. Focus for this course is on the impact both technological innovation and intellectual property law have on business strategies. This is not a class designed to teach students the law of intellectual property. Rather, this course educates business decision makers on the impact intellectual property can have on the bottom line. Not taught in 2009-10.
POLECON 349. The Business World: Moral and Spiritual Inquiry through Literature
This course uses novels and plays as a basis for examining the moral and spiritual aspects of business leadership and of the environment in which business is done. On the one hand literature is used as the basis for examining the character of business people, while on the other hand literature provides illumination of the cultural contexts of values and beliefs within which commercial activities take place in a global economy. The course is organized around the interplay of religious traditions and national identities.
POLECON 364. Antitrust
The principal areas of the federal antitrust field will be considered, including the legal and economic concepts of competition and monopoly, the policy and judicial interpretations of the Sherman Act and Clayton Act, and their applications to business practices and industrial structure. Ethical considerations in the practice of antitrust law will be considered throughout the course. Not taught in 2009-10.
POLECON 386. International Comparison of Corporate Governance
This course compares legal/political/economic systems of corporate governance systems found around the world. The focus of this comparison is on how corporate governance systems influence performance, including both individual firm performance and the allocation of capital within a country. This is of vital interest to various professional groups, such as Investment bankers, venture capitalists, and consultants. We will discuss the legal and institutional contexts, seeking answers to questions like these: Why are there so few publicly traded companies in Italy? Why is it so difficult to generate financial capital in Russia? and, most importantly, How are national economic growth and corporate governance related?
We compare corporate governance systems in various countries, studying both how systems do work and how they might work better, and asking such questions as: Why are take-overs and mergers more prevalent in the US and England than in other countries? How has this changed over time? Why are large controlling shareholders less prevalent in the US and England than in Germany? Why are top Japanese executives paid less than their American counterparts? How should executives and board of directors be remunerated given the political and economic framework in the country? How do CEOs decide about the mix of debt and equity finance and how does the mix affect their discretion and control over cash flow? Not taught in 2009-10.
POLECON 395. Politics and Business in Europe
The policies of the European Union (EU) have a tremendous impact on the activities of global companies. Companies that want access to the EU market of nearly half a billion consumers must comply with EU product standards. Mergers of companies active in the EU require EU approval. For these reasons it is important to understand the politics and policies of the EU. Europe is going through a period of rapid change both at the economic and political level. Markets are being deregulated, and political institutions are constantly being reformed. A single currency has been introduced, and the EU is expanding eastward. Trade disputes have become more prevalent, and transatlantic relations have been strained. This course studies the politics of the EU and its member states, the principal economic and political issues that are currently on the EU's agenda, and their effect on business. The course consists of class discussions, case studies, and a number of guest lectures by European business people and politicians. Not taught in 2009-10.
POLECON 510. Applied Ethics
This course focuses on the types of ethical decisions managers face and the challenges they encounter after they have decided on an ethical course of action. The main assumption underlying the course is that many ethical lapses arise from implementation failures. It is not enough for managers to address and think through the ethical implications of their decisions; they must also translate their ethical reasoning into action. This requires that they be able to articulate and defend an ethical position as well as implement it. This case-based course will teach students how to develop an ethical voice and how to implement ethical practices in different organizational contexts.
Among the topics addressed in the course are: How do companies ensure that the ethical standards of its leaders and employees are implemented? How can business leaders be made to see the inconsistency between their values and their actions? What structures can companies put into place to encourage ethical action and make it easier for employees to question the ethics of one another's actions? How can business leaders establish a balance between ethics and profitability? Not taught in 2009-10.
POLECON 520. Values in Business
This course explores how various value propositions affect managerial decisions. Value propositions are inescapably normative. Therefore, the course is concerned not only with what is (e.g., corporate behavior that can be described mostly in terms of economic motivations and consequences) but also with what ought to be (i.e., behavior motivated by broader moral concerns and/or the moral consequences of such behavior). The approaches taken in the course are more bottom-up than top-down. That is, the intention is to allow the normative underpinnings of business decisions to arise more-or-less naturally from concrete business situations rather than to forcefully superimpose abstract moral philosophies onto business situations. This is achieved through a series of cases and exercises that embody elements of utilitarianism, justice, duty, virtue, corporate responsibility, and value-based leadership. Not taught in 2009-10.
POLECON 530. Nonmarket Strategy—Advanced
This is an advanced applications class on nonmarket strategy. The topics covered in this class are: media relations, strategic interactions with activists, political coalition formation, strategic lobbying, regulation, antitrust policy, intellectual property, and the politics of international trade. This course places an emphasis on introducing students to foundational research in political economy. This research is then applied to specific strategic situations that companies face when dealing with activists, governments, and regulation.
POLECON 547. Intellectual Property and Its Effect on Business
This course explores the impact intellectual property rights have on business decisions. We begin with a general background of intellectual property law including copyright, trademark, patent and trade secret. We will also cover quasi property rights such as database and privacy. Each of these distinct rights will be examined through a case methodology affording students an opportunity to gauge the relative strengths and weaknesses of a particular form of protection. As the value of intellectual property rises, the avenues of economic return increase. We will analyze various methods of maximizing such economic returns. Focus for this course is on the impact both technological innovation and intellectual property law have on business strategies. This is not a class designed to teach students the law of intellectual property. Rather, this course educates business decision makers on the impact intellectual property can have on the bottom line. This course employs a mixed lecture/case discussion format. We will have several sessions with lectures by visiting industry experts.
POLECON 571. The Future of Growth: Developed and Developing World
The course deals with the recent (post war) sustained high growth in the developing world and its likely evolution and impact in the future. How are these kinds of growth rates possible? What accounts for the absence of growth in a part of the developing world? What are the key political ingredients? Attention will be given to the evolving global landscape surrounding this growth. What is the impact of this widening pattern of growth and are there natural brakes that may slow the process down or make it difficult for the non-G20 developing countries and their 1/3 of the world’s population to start or sustain the high growth process. The class will attempt to identify and assess the impact of important global trends and challenges. Included in the latter will be governance issues. We will spend a little time on the impact of the 2008-2009 crisis, the transmission channels and lessons learned from the vantage point of developing countries.