Next year, I will be delivering a module on the history of globalisation here at Coventry University. The module is aimed at first-year students in history and political science.The aim of this module is to introduce students to a range of social, economic and political themes in the history of globalisation. The module looks at global historical change from 1800 to the present. The emphasis is one three different types of globalisation: the globalisation of goods, the globalisation of ideas/culture, and the global migrations of peoples. The module will also discuss the history of global governance. The module will also introduce students to the ongoing scholarly debates about the history of globalisation. This module requires students to go further than mastering concrete historical facts about globalization and to engage with competing theories of globalisation.
Module Aims
The intended learning outcomes are that, on successful completion of this module, a student should be able to:
1. Demonstrate an awareness of the major events in the history of globalisation and the scholarly debate over when globalisation actually began.
2. Evaluate the political, economic, and technological foundations or causes of globalisation. A student should be able to discuss the debate among historians about what causes globalisation.
3. Discuss the impact of globalisation on diverse countries and on diverse economic groups with societies.
4. Become more familiar with research methods in History and be able to do a document analysis of a primary source.
5. Demonstrate a broad understanding of some theoretical debates in relation to globalisation.
Assessment
The intended learning outcomes will be assessed with: Coursework 1 (50% – 10 credits) will comprise a documentary analysis, or equivalent, of 1,000 words (15% – 3 credits) which will summatively assess intended learning outcomes 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5’ and Coursework 2 a 2,000-word essay, or equivalent (35% – 7 credits), which will summatively assess intended learning outcomes 1, 2, 3 and 5; a 2-hour unseen examination (50% – 10 credits) will summatively assess intended learning outcomes 1, 2 and 3. Re-assessment: Coursework component(s) and/or examination as appropriate.
Please note that no coursework will be marked until an identical electronic copy has also been submitted into the module web for a plagiarism check.
| Coursework 1: Book Review Deadline: 4pm, Thursday, 27 October 2011. | Rodrik, Dani. The Globalization Paradox: Democracy and the Future of the World Economy. New York: W. W. Norton & Co, 2011. | |
| Book reviews will be approximately 1,000 words (roughly 3-4 pages) in length. Although the book review is not due until November, you should buy the book immediately, since it may take some time to come through the mail. A précis of a book merely provides a descriptive summary of the book’s contents. A proper book review, on the other hand, involves going beyond mere description and requires the input of one’s own reasoned opinions. An essential feature of a good book review is the reviewer’s ability to write concisely so that a comprehensive evaluation of the book can be obtained from a brief reading. So, do not write more, write more concisely. I shall penalize people who go over the set word limit. |  |
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| A book review in a Level One Module should answer the following questions: -What is the book’s purpose? What is the author’s central thesis or argument? -Does the author prove his or her thesis? What sorts of arguments does he or she use? -Who is the author? How might their personal or professional background have influenced this book in some way? -What sorts of sources did the author read in the course of researching and writing this book? HINT: Read the footnotes and the bibliography. -How is the book organized? -Who would likely read such a book? |
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| Coursework 2: Research Essay. 2,000-words. Deadline: 4pm, Thursday 16 February 2012. |
| Your essay will be based on sources in the university library. A list of available topics is listed below. Your essay should be based on at least six scholarly sources. I shall elaborate on my expectation for the essay in lecture. |
| 1) How did the advent of telecommunications encourage the development of multilateral institutions of global governance? 2) What is the “gentlemanly capitalism thesis” and how does it advance our understanding of the British Empire’s role in global history? 3) How has neoliberalism changed the world since 1978? 4) How did people in Western Europe react to “Coca-colonization” after 1945? 5) How much progress has been made towards the creation of customs unions in Latin America? 6) How are the explanations for the Great Divergence provided by David Landes and Timur Kuran different from that offered by Ken Pomeranz? Which interpretation is most plausible? 7) Was the economic impact of British rule in India positive or negative? 8) What was the global ecological impact of the British Empire? 9) Why were Jeremy Bentham and J.A. Hobson opposed to British imperialism? How were their arguments similar? How were they different? 10) Europeans and Arabs used Africa as a source of slaves. What do the differences between the Atlantic and Arab slave trades say about the histories of globalisation and about the Great Divergence? |
Sources for these essay topics are as follows:
The following is not a comprehensive list of the sources needed to research each essay topic. Instead, I have decided to list just a few sources related to the topic that can serve as a point of departure for your own research in the library. In identifying additional sources for your essay, you should pay careful attention to the footnotes in the sources listed below.
Topic: How did the advent of telecommunications encourage the development of multilateral institutions of global governance? Sources: Gorman, Daniel. “Freedom of the Ether or the Electromagnetic Commons?: Globality, the Public Interest, and the Multilateral Radio Negotiations in the 1920s and 1930s” in Empires and Autonomy: Moments in the History of Globalization, Steven Streeter, John Weaver, William Coleman, eds. (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2009), 138-156; Headrick, Daniel. “Submarine Telegraph Cables: Business and Politics, 1838-1939″ in Business History Review (Fall 2001)
Topic: What is the “gentlemanly capitalism thesis” and how does it advance our understanding of the British Empire’s role in global history? Sources: Webster, Anthony. The Debate on the Rise of the British Empire. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2006; Daunton, M. J. State and Market in Victorian Britain: War, Welfare and Capitalism. Woodbridge, UK: Boydell Press, 2008; Akita, Shigeru. Gentlemanly Capitalism, Imperialism, and Global History. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002.
Topic: How has neoliberalism changed the world since 1978? Sources: Jeong, Seongjin. “The Korean Developmental State: From Dirigisme to Neoliberalism.” Historical Materialism 17, no. 3 (September 2009): 244-257; Harvey, David. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005; Duménil, Gérard, and Dominique Lévy. The Crisis of Neoliberalism. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 2011; Silva, Eduardo. Challenging Neoliberalism in Latin America. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009; Giroux, Henry A. “Beyond the biopolitics of disposability: rethinking neoliberalism in the New Gilded Age.” Social Identities 14, no. 5 (September 2008): 587-620.
Topic: How did people in Western Europe react to “Coca-colonization” after 1945? Sources: Judt, Tony. Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945. London: William Heinemann, 2005;Berghahn, Volker R. 2010. “The debate on ‘Americanization’ among economic and cultural historians.” In Cold War History, 107-130; Schroter, Harm G. 2008. “Economic culture and its transfer: an overview of the Americanisation of the European economy, 1900-2005.” European Review of History 15, no. 4: 331-344; Duignan, Peter, and Lewis H. Gann. The Rebirth of the West: The Americanization of the Democratic World, 1945-1958. Cambridge, Mass., USA: Blackwell, 1992; Lundestad, Geir. Empire by Integration: The United States and European Integration, 1945-1997. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998; Nixon, Sean. “Apostles of Americanization? J. Walter Thompson Company Ltd, Advertising and Anglo-American Relations 1945-67.” Contemporary British History 22, no. 4 (December 2008): 477-499; Hilger, Susanne. 2008. “‘Globalisation by Americanisation’: American companies and the internationalisation of German industry after the Second World War.” European Review of History 15, no. 4: 375-401; Gassert, Philipp. “The Anti-American as Americanizer: Revisiting the Anti-American Century in Germany.” German Politics & Society 27, no. 1 (April 30, 2009): 24-38.
Topic: How much progress has been made towards the creation of customs unions in Latin America? Sources: Duina, Francesco G. The Social Construction of Free Trade: The European Union, NAFTA, and MERCOSUR. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2006; Cambridge Review of International Affairs 18, no. 3 (October 2005): 421-436; Gardini, Gian Luca. “Who Invented Mercosur?.” Diplomacy & Statecraft 18, no. 4 (December 2007): 805-830; Christensen, Steen Fryba. “The influence of nationalism in Mercosur and in South America — can the regional integration project survive?.” Revista Brasileira de Política Internacional 50, no. 1 (July 2007): 139-158; Duina, Francesco. “Varieties of Regional Integration: The EU, NAFTA and Mercosur.” Journal of European Integration 28, no. 3 (July 2006): 247-275; Drake, Paul W. Between Tyranny and Anarchy: A History of Democracy in Latin America, 1800-2006. Stanford, Calif: Stanford University Press, 2009
Topic: How are the explanations for the Great Divergence provided by David Landes and Timur Kuran different from that offered by Ken Pomeranz? Whose theory is most convincing? Sources: Pomeranz, Kenneth. The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2000; Landes, David S. 2006. “Why Europe and the West? Why Not China?” The Journal of Economic Perspectives. 20, no. 2: 3-22;Horesh, Niv. “What Time Is the “Great Divergence”? And Why Economic Historians Think It Matters.” China Review International 16, no. 1 (March 2009): 18-32; Vries, P. H. H. “Are Coal and Colonies Really Crucial? Kenneth Pomeranz and the Great Divergence(*).” Journal of World History 12, no. 2 (Fall2001 2001): 407; O’Brien, Patrick K. 2009. “The Needham Question Updated: A Historiographical Survey and Elaboration”. History of Technology. 29: 7; Kuran, Timur. 2004. “Why the Middle East Is Economically Underdeveloped: Historical Mechanisms of Institutional Stagnation”. Journal of Economic Perspectives. 18, no. 3: 71-90.
Topic: Was the economic impact of British rule in India positive or negative? Sources: Subrahmanyam, Gita. “Ruling continuities: Colonial rule, social forces and path dependence in British India and Africa.” Commonwealth & Comparative Politics 44, no. 1 (March 2006): 66-92; Desai, Manali. “Indirect British Rule, State Formation, and Welfarism in Kerala, India,1860–1957.” Social Science History 29, no. 3 (Fall2005 2005): 457-488; Rothermund, Dietmar. An Economic History of India From Pre-Colonial Times to 1991. London: Routledge, 1993;Davis, Mike. Late Victorian Holocausts: El Niño Famines and the Making of the Third World. London: Verso, 2001; Washbrook, David. 2010. “Merchants, Markets, and Commerce in Early Modern South India.” Journal of the Economic & Social History of the Orient 53, no. 1/2: 266-289; Klein, Ira. “British Reforms, Commercial Agriculture, and Agrarian Distress in India.” Historian 70, no. 4 (Winter2008 2008): 732-752; Iyer L. 2010. “Direct Versus Indirect Colonial Rule in India: Long-Term Consequences”. Review of Economics and Statistics. 92, no. 4: 693-713.
Topic: What was the global ecological impact of the British Empire? Source: Beinart, William, and Lotte Hughes. Environment and Empire. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007;
Topic: Why were Jeremy Bentham and J.A. Hobson opposed to British imperialism? How were their arguments similar? How were they different? Sources: Cain, Peter J. Hobson and Imperialism: Radicalism, New Liberalism, and Finance 1887 – 1938. Oxford [u.a.]: Oxford Univ. Press, 2002; Porter, Bernard. Critics of Empire: British Radicals and the Imperial Challenge. London: I. B. Tauris, 2008
Topic: Europeans and Arabs used Africa as a source of slaves. What do the differences between the Atlantic and Arab slave trades say about the histories of globalisation and about the Great Divergence? Sources: Black, Jeremy. The Slave Trade. London: Social Affairs Unit, 2006;Lydon, Ghislaine. “Islamic Legal Culture and Slave-Ownership Contests in Nineteenth-Century Sahara.” International Journal of African Historical Studies 40, no. 3 (October 2007): 391-439; Ewald, Janet J. “Crossers of the Sea: Slaves, Freedmen, and Other Migrants in the Northwestern Indian Ocean, c. 1750-1914.” American Historical Review 105, no. 1 (February 2000): 69; Carter, Marina. 2006. “Slavery and Unfree Labour in the Indian Ocean”. History Compass. 4, no. 5: 800-813; Campbell, Gwyn. 2003. “Introduction: Slavery and Other Forms of Unfree Labour in the Indian Ocean World”. Slavery & Abolition. 24, no. 2: 9-32;Amin, Samir. 1997. “Trans-Saharan Exchange and the Black Slave Trade”. Diogenes. no. 179: 31; Allen, Richard B. “Satisfying the “Want for Labouring People”: European Slave Trading in the Indian Ocean, 1500-1850.” Journal of World History 21, no. 1 (March 2010): 45-73.
List of Lectures and Readings for Weekly Seminars
Autumn Term
| Week | lecture | seminar readings | |||||
| 1 | What is Global History? |
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| 2 | The Great Divergence |
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| 3 | The Golden Age of the Dutch Economy |
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| 4 | Empire and Globalisation | Seminar Theme: Why were Large Empires Formed?
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| 5 | The Enlightened Economy |
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| 6 | Free Trade | seminar theme: early mncs
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| 7 | When WASPs Swarmed | seminar theme: the anglo settler revolution Cain, Peter J. 2010. “The Economics and Ideologies of Anglo-American Settlerism, 1780-1939.” Victorian Studies 53, no. 1: 100-107.
Podcast: Environmental histories of settlement in Canada and New Zealand http://www.eh-resources.org/podcast/podcast2008.html |
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| 8 | Tentacles of Progress |
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| 9 | Culture and Empire |
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| 10 | Apogee of Empire |
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| 11 | Empire and the Environment | seminar theme: empire and environment
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Winter Term
| Week | lecture | Readings For Seminar | |||||
| 1 | Backlash to Globalisation |
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| 2 | Migrations |
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| 3 | The First World War and Deglobalisation |
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| 4 | Restarting Globalisation | seminar theme: post-1944 economic institutions
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| 5 | The Rise of Regional Trading Blocks |
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| 6 | The Box That Changed the World |
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| 7 | Managing MNCs |
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| 8 | The Rise of Hollywood to Global Dominance | seminar theme: varieties of capitalism
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| 9 | The Bond Rating Agencies |
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| 10 | The Politics of Oil |
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| 11 | Neo-liberalism |
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| 12 | Conclusion | seminar theme: history as a guide to the future
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Module Aims The intended learning outcomes are that, on successful completion of this module, a student should be able to: 1. Demonstrate an awareness of the major events in the history of globalisation and the scholarly debate over when globalisation actually began. 2. Evaluate the political, economic, and technological foundations or causes of globalisation. A student should be able to discuss the debate among historians about what causes globalisation. 3. Discuss the impact of globalisation on diverse countries and on diverse economic groups with societies. 4. Become more familiar with research methods in History and be able to do a document analysis of a primary source. 5. Demonstrate a broad understanding of some theoretical debates in relation to globalisation. The aim of this module is to introduce students to a range of social, economic and political themes in the history of globalisation. The module looks at global historical change from 1800 to the present. The emphasis is one three different types of globalisation: the globalisation of goods, the globalisation of ideas/culture, and the global migrations of peoples. The module will also discuss the history of global governance. The module will also introduce students to the ongoing scholarly debates about the history of globalisation. This module requires students to go further than mastering concrete historical facts about globalization. It asks them to think historically about their own lived experiences. The students should be able to evaluate debates over globalization and take a position in those debates by marshalling historical evidence. Ultimately, this class is designed to enable each student to see the historical and global connectedness of his or her own life.
Assessment The intended learning outcomes will be assessed with: Coursework 1 (50% – 10 credits) will comprise a documentary analysis, or equivalent, of 1,000 words (15% – 3 credits) which will summatively assess intended learning outcomes 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5’ and Coursework 2 a 2,000-word essay, or equivalent (35% – 7 credits), which will summatively assess intended learning outcomes 1, 2, 3 and 5; a 2-hour unseen examination (50% – 10 credits) will summatively assess intended learning outcomes 1, 2 and 3. Re-assessment: Coursework component(s) and/or examination as appropriate. Please note that no coursework will be marked until an identical electronic copy has also been submitted into the module web for a plagiarism check. order to pass the module.
| Coursework 1: Book Review Deadline: 4pm, Thursday, 27 October 2011. | Rodrik, Dani. The Globalization Paradox: Democracy and the Future of the World Economy. New York: W. W. Norton & Co, 2011. | |
| Book reviews will be approximately 1,000 words (roughly 3-4 pages) in length. Although the book review is not due until November, you should buy the book immediately, since it may take some time to come through the mail. A précis of a book merely provides a descriptive summary of the book’s contents. A proper book review, on the other hand, involves going beyond mere description and requires the input of one’s own reasoned opinions. An essential feature of a good book review is the reviewer’s ability to write concisely so that a comprehensive evaluation of the book can be obtained from a brief reading. So, do not write more, write more concisely. I shall penalize people who go over the set word limit. | |
|
| A book review in a Level One Module should answer the following questions: -What is the book’s purpose? What is the author’s central thesis or argument? -Does the author prove his or her thesis? What sorts of arguments does he or she use? -Who is the author? How might their personal or professional background have influenced this book in some way? -What sorts of sources did the author read in the course of researching and writing this book? HINT: Read the footnotes and the bibliography. -How is the book organized? -Who would likely read such a book? |
||
| Coursework 2: Research Essay. 2,000-words. Deadline: 4pm, Thursday 16 February 2012. |
| Your essay will be based on sources in the university library. A list of available topics is listed below. Your essay should be based on at least six scholarly sources. I shall elaborate on my expectation for the essay in lecture. |
| 1) How did the advent of telecommunications encourage the development of multilateral institutions of global governance? 2) What is the “gentlemanly capitalism thesis” and how does it advance our understanding of the British Empire’s role in global history? 3) How has neoliberalism changed the world since 1978? 4) How did people in Western Europe react to “Coca-colonization” after 1945? 5) How much progress has been made towards the creation of customs unions in Latin America? 6) How are the explanations for the Great Divergence provided by David Landes and Timur Kuran different from that offered by Ken Pomeranz? Which interpretation is most plausible? 7) Was the economic impact of British rule in India positive or negative? 8) What was the global ecological impact of the British Empire? 9) Why were Jeremy Bentham and J.A. Hobson opposed to British imperialism? How were their arguments similar? How were they different? 10) Europeans and Arabs used Africa as a source of slaves. What do the differences between the Atlantic and Arab slave trades say about the histories of globalisation and about the Great Divergence? |
Sources for these essay topics can be found at the end of the module guide.
The Past Speaks 