Module description
Financial markets underpin modern economies; financial crises can wreck them. The module focuses on financial systems and the manifestations of financialisation and crises in advanced economies, as well as the Global South. Drawing on research in political economy, we will analyse the current state of contemporary finance, as well as the origins and impact of financial crises – particularly the Global Financial Crisis. Combining theoretical and empirical perspectives, the module will explore money and banking in contemporary capitalism; central banking and monetary policy; the functions of contemporary financial markets; domestic and international financialisation; the structure of the international monetary and financial system; and the causes and of the 2007-08 Global Financial Crisis and the 2010-2012 Eurozone crisis. Term one focuses on money, banking, and central banking in contemporary capitalism and the different aspects of financialisation on a domestic and international scale. Term two explores theories of crises and the manifestations of several financial crises in different parts of the world.
*Please note that module information is provisional and may change from year to year.
Suitable for Economics and International Management Students
Assessment details
One 2000 word essay (50%) and one 2000 word supervised project (50%)
Educational aims & objectives
- to cover key areas of modern finance and identify their interrelations: institutions involved in the financial sector, how finance as a distinct domain of the economy works, how it has changed over the last decades, why financial crises happen, and how they affect the real economy;
- to convey the recent state and current debates within the political economy of money, finance and crises;
- to provide analytical tools to critically examine the workings of a major, yet often mystified, sector of modern economies.
Learning outcomes
At the end of the module students will be able to:
- explain fundamental concepts in banking and finance
- describe the current state of research in the political economy of finance and crises;
- choose an appropriate mix of sources to critically assess the main empirical debates in the sub-fields of the political economy of finance and crises;
- identify and critically evaluate the main policy tools to regulate finance and to manage financial crises
- relate and contrast the reasoning, principles, goals and instruments of the key players in finance and financial regulation;
- critically reflect on the relationship of money, finance and crises with broader socio-political aspects
Teaching pattern
Two hours per week, one lecture and one seminar
Indicative teaching schedule
Term I – Money & Finance in Capitalism and Financialisation
Week 1: Introduction: financial systems, financialisation and financial crisis
Week 2: Money & banking: What do banks do?
Week 3: Central banks and monetary policy
Week 4: Credit and the macroeconomy
Week 5: Theories of money
Week 6: Financial markets
Week 7: Securitisation and the shadow banking system
Week 8: Domestic financialisation: shareholder value orientation and household debt
Week 9: Exchange rate regimes and the international monetary system
Week 10: International financialisation: financial globalisation, capital flows and current account imbalances
Term II – The Causes and Consequences of Financial Crises Around the Globe
Week 11: Capital flows and financial crises in emerging markets
Week 12: The US subprime crisis I: build-up, outbreak, contagion
Week 13: The US subprime crisis II: real effects and crisis management
Week 14: Emerging markets during and after the Global Financial Crisis
Week 15: Mainstream approaches to financial crises
Week 16: Post-Keynesian approaches to financial crises
Week 17: Marxian approaches to financial crises
Week 18: The Eurozone crisis and its management
Week 19: Sources of the Eurozone crisis: fiscal profligacy, balance-of-payments problems, or flawed EMU design?
Week 20: Financial regulation: prudential regulation and capital controls
Note that this teaching schedule is indicative and subject to change.
Suggested reading list
Core texts
In addition to the core texts listed below there will be additional weekly readings available on KEATS.
- Andrews, David M. (ed.), International Monetary Power (Cornell: Cornell University Press, 2006).
- De Goede, Marieke, Virtue, Fortune and Faith: A Genealogy of Finance (Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, 2005).
- Eichengreen, Barry, Globalizing Capital: A History of the International Monetary System (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008).
- Epstein, Gerald A. (ed.), Financialization and the World Economy (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 2005).
- Porter, Tony, Globalization and Finance (Cambridge: Polity, 2005).
- Ravenhill, John (ed.), Global Political Economy, 4th ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014).
- Reinhart, Carmen M., and Kenneth S. Rogoff, This Time is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009).
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·Ryan-Collins, Josh, Greenham, Tony, Werner, Richard, Jackson, Andrew Where does money come from? A Guide to the UK Monetary and Banking System (London: New Economics Foundation, 2012).