IPE-Lecture 01 (07 October 2021) (1).ppt

International political economy

1. POSO007S7
INTERNATIONAL POLITICAL ECONOMY
2021-2022
Dr Ali BurakGüven: [email protected]
Dr David Styan: [email protected]
07 October 2021
INTRODUCTION: WHAT IS IPE?
This session introduces the main themes and selected literature in
IPE. It discusses to what extent IPE can be considered a distinct
discipline, and briefly contrasts UK and US approaches.

2. How and why did IPE emerge as an academic
subject?
Do scholars agree over the core concepts to be
studied within IPE?
Why does Halliday see Strange and Polanyi as
being key scholars in the study of international
relations?
What differences does Cohen highlight between
US and European approaches to IPE?

3. LECTURE OUTLINE
1.Module Basics
•Lectures
•Seminars
•Assessment
•Module Outline
2. Introducing the Academic Study of IPE
•Journals / Textbooks / Collections
•Origins (Susan Strange: Karl Polanyi): chronology 1960s/70s
•Objects of Study (Underhill)
•American versus British IPE? (Cohen)
•The State of the (Inter)Discipline
•A Few Classic Texts
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4. Panic, plan, calm …
•Another year of transition → Now
from online to hybrid learning. First
fortnight mayhem to be expected…
•Many resources & arrangements are
work in progress. Re-read, check,
reconfirm.
•Time management: This term, not
much in the way of assignments in
this module. Read widely, try to
absorb, find your rhythm.
•2019-20 & 2020-21 students coped
well; so will you.
•Communicate and help each other…

5. 1. MODULE BASICS
Pre-recorded LECTURES
Autumn → Dr Ali Burak Güven
Spring → Dr David Styan (?)
Moodle site:moodle.bbk.ac.uk
1. The majority of the core readings and some further readings are
available via Moodle.
2.This -above all in the Module Handbook -is also where you will find
lecture outlines/presentations, seminar questions, important
announcements, and all other course-relevant material.
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6. SEMINARS AND PRESENTATIONS
•Weekly in-person seminars on Thursdays at BMA (Dickens Room). Two groups:
Group 1: 18:00-19:30 (to wind down at around 19:15)
Group 2: 19:30-21:00 (to wind down at around 20:45)
•Depending on room size + weekly class attendance, we may be able to consolidate
the two groups.
•For students who are unable to attend in-person seminars due to Covid and other
reasons, there will be online interactive catch-up sessions 3 times per term (6
sessions throughout the module). Dates/times TBA.
Presentations:
•Each student is expected to present at least oncethroughout the year.
•Presentations will be no more than 10 minutesin duration.
•Students will present on a minimum of two readingsfrom either the required or
the supplementary readings listed under the relevant week. Students are
particularly encouraged to select from the supplementary readings.
•Rather than summarising the readings, students should aim at engaging the
material criticallyin line with the essay questionson p. 30 of the handbook.
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7. ASSESSMENT
•All studentswill write one essay,and sit the year-end exam (take-home test),and
submit two seminar logs (one per term).
ESSAY (45%)
•The essay is due on 28 February 2022 at 12 pm (noon)
•3,500 wordsincluding footnotes and bibliography (+/–10%)
•Essay questionsare enclosed in the module handbook (p. 30).
•All essays are submitted via Moodle(look under the Assignmentstab and follow
the instructions in the weeks prior to essay deadline).
•Marks and feedback to be released on 21 March 2022
EXAM (TAKE-HOME TEST) (45%)
•This is an open book take-home test. Questions will be released on 27 April 2022
(at noon); answers will be due on 29 April 2021 (at noon.).
•Students will answer 3 questions out of 12 questions; ~ 1,000 words each.
•Students can access past exam questionson the Library website:
http://www.bbk.ac.uk/lib/elib/exam
SEMINAR LOGS (10%)
•Two seminar logs, 500 words each. Due dates: 17 December 2021; 25 March 2022
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8. MODULE OUTLINE (page 5 of handbook)
TOPIC
Introduction: What Is IPE?
IPE and Realism
Classical Political Economy, Free Trade & Slavery
Empire and 19
th
Century Globalisation
Depression and War
Keynes and the Post-1945 International Architecture
Decolonisation, Structural and Marxist Analyses
Polanyi and the Double Movement
BREAK
Commodities:GVCs and the Coffee Industry
World Trade: From GATT to the WTO
Multinational Companies and Production
Regional Trading Blocs
Migration and Remittances
Financial Liberalisation
The Environmental Politics of the IPE
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9. 2. INTRODUCING THE ACADEMIC STUDY OF IPE
•First and foremost: IPE is a field of study; not a topic or theme.
JOURNALS / TEXTBOOKS / COLLECTIONS See pp. 6-8.
•International Organization [US Mainstream]
•Review of International Political Economy [ British / Critical ]
•IPE articles quite common in IR, political science, geography and development
journals such as International Studies Quarterly, Review of International Studies,
European Journal of International Relations, Geoforum, Global Governance,
International Studies Review, New Political Economy, Third World Quarterly,
International Affairs, World Politics, Development and Change, World
Development, Global Policy, Review of International Organizations..
•You can access all of these journals on BBK Library website: eJournals
Widely used textbooks / collections:
•Ravenhill –See the OUP link under “Reading List / Module Handbook”
•Stubbs & Underhill; Frieden& Lake; O’Brien & Williams; Gilpin
•Cohen: An Advanced Introduction to IPE. (highly recommended)
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14. Susan Strange (1923 -1998)

15. Karl Polanyi (1886 1964)
See Halliday text on Strange and Polanyi

16. The origins of IPE as a discipline
•Susan Strange as a major figure in formally establishing the field. 1970
International Affairs article: “International Economics and International Relations:
A Case of Mutual Neglect”
•Trends evident in the 1960s made clear many important phenomena fell through
the wide cracks between economics and IR, under-researched, mis-understood, by
academics and policy makers. Sense of dissatisfaction with existing scholarship.
“Real World” changes: 1960s-70s
---Multinationalcompanies
---Endoffixed(dollar)exchangerates-riseoffinanceneedforcoordination
(G7,1975)
---Impactofnewcommunicationstechnologies
---Challengetodeclining‘industrial’powers(OECD)fromAsia:Japan,Korea,
‘tigers’
---Commodityand‘developingcountry’power
---NewInternationalEconomicOrder(mid-1970s)
---Emergenceofnon-aligned,‘ThirdWorld’
---Ashiftinstructuralpower?(vsrelationalpower)
structuralpower=production:security;knowledge;finance

17. OBJECTS OF STUDY
•The intersection of:
a. The political(power/state) and the economic(production/markets)
b. National (state), international (inter-state; IOs-IGOs), and global (??)
IPE or GPE? Interdependence vs. globalisation? Thus, very close links to
another field of study: comparative political economy (CPE)
•A few common assumptions across IPE approaches (Underhill):
a. Inseparability of the political and the economic; origins rooted more in political
economy than international relations (IR)
b. Political foundations of market/economic relations
c. Inseparability of national and international levels of analysis
•Core approaches (Gilpin; cf. Watson next week):
a. Realism/statism/(neo)mercantilism, e.g. hegemonic stability
b. Liberalism/liberal internationalism/interdependence, e.g. regime theory
c. Marxism/critical, e.g. neo-Polanyian/neo-Gramscianperspectives
d. Constructivism (role of ideas, identities, culture etc. and not just interests)
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18. OBJECTS OF STUDY (continued)
•The politics of international economic relations and/or the economic dimension of
international politics
•Realist/Mercantilist: Shifts in international economic “power balance” (the rise
and fall of regional/international powers)
•Liberal/Institutionalist/Interdependence: Patterns of cooperation and
coordination; global governance; international organisations (IMF/WB..)
•Critical: Global power elites; structural sources of development/
underdevelopment; the global economic processes/consequences of gender/racial
inequality.
Sectoraland Issue Area-Specific:
•Global finance / convergence on standards
•Global production (MNCs / TNCs)
•Global trade (e.g. agricultural goods)
•Intellectual property rights (e.g. pharmaceutical patents)
•Environment / gender...
•Global governance/global policy coordination linking all of the above
•Development / power + wealth disparities and shifts linking all of the above
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19. The scope of IPE (John Ravenhill)
•Interrelationship between public and private power in the allocation of scarce
resources
•Who gets what, when and how? (Could add where… globally…)
•Relational(between states) power, and structural(setting agendas) power… who
sets the rules?
•Which conditions are more favourable for the evolution of cooperation among
states in an environment where no central enforcement agency is present?
•Diversity of approaches and methodologies
–Realism (statism, protectionism); liberalism; structural/Marxist
•All major texts offer variations on a theme
Core issues: exercise of power / creation and distribution of wealth
Core institutions:states / markets
Core actors: governments / firms / civil society

20. AMERICAN VERSUS BRITISH IPE (Cohen, Waever)

21. 21

22. STATE OF THE (INTER)DISCIPLINE
•Booming academic field, more so over the past few years given the global
economic crisis.
•All “schools” and “theories” have much to say on the current evolution, e.g. rise
and fall of powers, intensified rivalries, the significance of state action, problems of
coordination, need for more effective international regimes, structural fragilities in
the international economy, continuing issues of inequality and human/
environmental exploitation...
•Rising interest from other (sub/inter) disciplines; economic anthropology,
economics, history, sociology/social theory, public policy, security studies,
development studies, gender studies...
•More emphasis on empirically/historically grounded work (qualitative as well as
quantitative methodologies) and theoretical synthesizing.
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23. A FEW CLASSIC TEXTS
Karl Polanyi / The Great Transformation (1944)
Charles Kindleberger/ The World in Depression (1973)
Stephen Krasner (ed.) / International Regimes (1983)
Robert Keohane/ After Hegemony (1984)
Robert Cox / Production, Power and World Order (1987)
Susan Strange / Casino Capitalism (1986)
Eric Helleiner/ States and the Re-Emergence of Global Finance (1994)
Susan Strange / The Retreat of the State (1996)
Paul Hirst& Grahame Thompson / Globalisation in Question (1996)
Barry Eichengreen/ Globalizing Capital (1996)
Peter Katzenstein/ A World of Regions (2005)
Jeffry Frieden/ Global Capitalism (2007)
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24. Essential Readings
•Cohen, B. 2007, “The transatlantic divide: Why are American and British
IPE so different?” Review of International Political Economy14:2 May
2007: 197–219. Online:
https://www.polsci.ucsb.edu/sites/secure.lsit.ucsb.edu.poli.d7-
3/files/sitefiles/people/cohen/recent/RRIP_A_228731_O.pdf
•Katzenstein P, Keohane, R., and Krasner, S. 1998, International
Organization and the Study of World Politics, International Organization,
Vol. 52 no. 4 (1998): 645-85. JSTOR
•Underhill, G.D.R. 2000, “State, market and global political economy;
genealogy of an (inter?) discipline”, in International Affairs, 76 (4)
•Halliday, F. 2001, ‘The revenge of ideas: Karl Polanyi and Susan Strange’
in Political Journeys; the openDemocracy essays, London: Saqi. Also on-line
at https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/the-revenge-of-ideas-karl-polanyi-
and-susan-strange/
•Frieden, Jeffrey. 2020. Global Capitalism: Its Fall and Rise in the Twentieth
Century, and Its Stumbles in the Twenty-First. New York: W. W. Norton.