Govern in Dev: Thinking Strat

1.5 Credits · Level: Graduate

Most countries consider fighting poverty as a priority. However, policies that should be effective in generating positive development outcomes are often not adopted, are poorly implemented, or end up backfiring over time. Traditional economics mainly studies what policies and interventions are needed to generate better outcomes, often framing the analysis as interventions aimed at fixing market failures, or at promoting redistribution. Much less attention has been given to learning why those approaches succeed so well in some contexts but fail to generate positive results in others. This course examines why well-intended and well-designed anti-poverty policies remain so often ineffective. In particular, in this course, poverty and prosperity are intended as the result of the interaction between state and non-state actors, institutions, and social norms. The course will discuss how development issues such as conflict, lack of economic growth, and poverty can be interpreted as the outcome of governance failures, defined as power asymmetries, in the form of exclusion, elite capture, and clientelism. Finally, it will discuss how change can be brought about to break vicious cycles and foster prosperity.