No Email please. If you need to see me please do so during
my office hours, M-T:
Do not PRINT this syllabus until we finalize
the presentation schedule. Once this is done, we will finalize the lecture,
presenation schedule and case studies.
Prequesites for this course: Econ 3070 and Econ 3080. If you
signed up for this course but have not taken these courses, I will assume
that you are able to follow the discussion and material coverage on economic
policy and theory covered in the pre-requesites. This will also be necessary
for your paper since you need to show your understanding of the major economic
issues for the country or region that you choose.
Objective of the Course:
This course will deal with the overall political economy of the
First, the course will help you understand and discuss the relevant issues that are important to this region as well as its strategic importance to the West and the United States. The region is often associated with oil, Islam, the Palestinian-Israeli peace process and overall instability that occurs in different parts of the area. Through class discussion and presentations, we will try to focus on the main issues as well as use current events to highlight and emphasize topics that are important to our class. Some days, class discussions may be driven by current unfolding events.
Second, the course will also help you identify the religious, historical, social, political, economic and security issues that affect the region as a whole. Again, students are encouraged to read the papers (print and via the Web) to discuss ongoing developments either for the whole region or developments that affect their particular country or countries. The emphasis will be on the economic development, policy and overall economic issues facing your country or region of interest.
Third, we will also make an attempt to compare the Economic and Political developments in the region with other regions of the world. Has democracy taken hold? Why or why not? Has the region achieved sustainable economic growth and development? Why or why not? Finally, I will invite a number of outside speakers-depending on their schedule- who will speak to the class on specific topics, such as the role of Islam, politics in the region, the economic models chosen by these countries and why, and other topics by people who have lived in the region.
Fourth: Your paper will have to have a minimum of half of its content-for a better paper more is needed-dealing with en economic issue of the country, region, topic at hand.
Fifth: We will have guest lectures whenever possible if the speakers are available.For the summer, this may be hard but we will try.
Sixth: E-Reserves has a number of articles posted on it. These will be assigned in class as the material and the topic as well as the events are fluid and change so we need to be flexible. The list of articles will be expanded. I have a number of articles but after we get a clear picture as what will be presented, then we will decide what will posted on E-Reserve.
Main Sources:
1.
Arab Human Development Report 2003, United Nations Development Program, 2003
found at: http://www.miftah.org/Doc/Reports/Englishcomplete2003.pdf
http://www.undp.org/rbas/ahdr/
2. Arab World Competitiveness
Report 2002-2003, The World Economic Forum,
http://www.weforum.org/site/homepublic.nsf/Content/Global+Competitiveness+Programme\Regional+Competitiveness+Reports\Arab+World+Competitiveness+Report+2002-2003
3. The Gulf 2000 Site: Covers the
following countries:
4. The IMF and the World Bank
University of Texas, Austin
http://menic.utexas.edu/menic.html
Harvard University http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~mideast/inMEres/inMEres.html
Optional from the library and for your paper projects:
Peter Mansfield, A
History of the
H.W. Brands, Into the Labyrinth: The
Ian J. Bickerton and Carla L.
Klausner, A Concise History of the Arab-Israeli
Conflict (4th edition)
James F. Hoge, Jr. and Gideon
Rose (editors), How Did This Happen? Terrorism and the New War
Read the National Security Directive 54, ordering the
www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB21/06-01.htm
I have the whole document and I can try to have you access
it on the web from my site but you should read part or the whole CIA document on
the 1953 as published by the New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/mideast/041600iran-cia-index.html.
The Politics of Oil: see F.
Gregory Gause, III, Oil Monarchies , chapter
3 on “Oil and Politics.” Available from McGill University-Universite de Montreal Interuniversity Consortium on Arab
Studies:
http://www.arts.mcgill.ca/programs/icas/gause/chapter3.html
Democracy
in the Arab World, see Daniel Brumberg,
“Liberalization versus Democracy:
Understanding Arab Political Reform,”
http://www.ceip.org/files/pdf/wp37.pdf
You can either print these reports or just read chapter by chapter as we
go along and depending on your country of interest. We may not have the time to
read all of it, but these are is the FIRST authoritative reports written by Arab
scholars on the region and is somewhat critical on a number of issues such as
economic, social and political that we will be discussion in
class.
Optional
Text:
"A political economy of the
I will try to leave
a copy on reserve but if you wish to buy a copy, you can do so. It has not been
ordered so you may want to get it on-line which may be cheaper.
"The Arab World Facing The Challenge of the New Millennium" by Henry T.
Azzam, I.B. Taurus, 2002
Elias H. Tuma,
Economic and Political Change in the Middle East, (Palo Alto, Pacific
Books, 1987)
Colbert C. Held, Middle East Patterns: Places, Peoples, and
Politics, 2nd edition, (Boulder, Westview Press
1994)
Other Sources:
You have to subscribe to
(or have access to) either The Wall Street Journal,
The New York Times or
The Economist , The Library
of Congress and the CIA's site are also good sources. Access to the New York
Times is free for some parts of the paper. Access to the Economist is limited.
However, The Wall Street Journal gives you access to more than one paper.
Once you subscribe to it, you will have access to the European edition of
the journal as well as the Asian edition in addition to Barron's and the ability
to do searches. I also highly recommend that
you bookmark the site for the Financial Times of London which covers the
"Plan of Attack" by Bob Woodword,
2004, Simon and Schuster
"Against all Enemies" by Richard A Clarke, 2004, Free press
"The 9/11 Commission Report" found on the web at: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/911/
We will be viewing a number of case studies, the order of which will be determined after we clear the presentation schedule and the topics from the class.
2. Norlin Library:
You need to compile to a good reference list of recent works published on the country(ies) that you will be working on. These can be books, journals, periodicals etc...One particular source that I highly recommend is Finance and Development, published by the IMF and The World Bank. Each December issue will have a complete list of the articles published during that year. I highly recommend that you use it or try to search the data base at the library so that you can locate the articles that you need. Articles published in Finance and Development tend to be short and the to point with, at times, considerable ammout of data.
3. The World Bank's World Development Report (annual), The Internatinal Monetary Fund's International Financial
Statistics.
4. http://www.uae-pages.com/me-newspaper.htm,
some papers are in Arabic, just ignore those (some of you may be able to read
Arabic but most probably won't.)
5. This is a MUST stop for your research:
http://gulf2000.columbia.edu/,
from this site, you can get all kinds of information on the Gulf
(
Must sites and sources for your research:
Library of Congress: http://memory.loc.gov/frd/cs/
, here you can find country report on almost any country that you decide to
study or do your paper on.
There is one site out of
The World Bank special page on the
region: http://lnweb18.worldbank.org/mna/mena.nsf?OpenDatabase
The International Monetary Fund at: http://www.imf.org/ and particularly Finance and
Development at: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2003/12/index.htm
where you can find report on all of the countries of the region. Just do a
search under the country's name.
The CIA's site for the annual fact book at: http://www.cia.gov/
and particularly at: http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook/docs/faqs.html
This
will give you up to date information also. Finally The World Bank’s
Also search for sites that are particular to your country(ries). There are number of
Research centers and institutes that specialize in the study of the Middle
East and North Africa, your goal and objective is to "hunt" and find as many
as you can and as a class, we will compile the best and post them on our class
home page. Also, each student must compile a list of important and relevant
sites for the country(ies) that they are working on. This list should be part of
the paper and appended at the end of the paper after the bibliography.
NOTE: You are expected to come to class each day with at least one story on your country/area/topic (complet source of the story should be included in your article) from a major paper such as the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times, The Economist Or other well known and establshed sources. We will begin the class with a discussion of a major current event and how it relates to our class.
Week One: Introduction, discussion of sources, and topic discussion
Here are a few areas and countries that you may consider. One presentation
per student:
Islamic Economics
Islamic Banking
OPEC, World oil markets and US energy policy
Arab Economies and competitiveness in the global economy (see the Arab Competitive
report source cited earlier)
Any one of these countries or regions:
The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC)
The Maghreb
Afghanistan
Algeria
Bahrain (alone or part of the GCC)
Egypt
Israel
Jordan
Kuwait (alone or part of the GCC)
Lebanon
Libya
Qatar (either alone or part of the GCC)
Morocco
Oman (alone or part of the GCC)
Saudi Arabia (either alone or part of the GCC)
Sudan
Syria
Tunisia
Turkey
United Arab Emirate (either alone or part of the GCC)
West Bank and Gaza
If you have a topic in mind, you need to clear it with me first. You need
to make your choices immediately. Once a country/topic is claimed you need
to choose another one.
Topic One: Iraq from Gulf War 1, to Gulf War III. Case studies and Articles
to reviewd and discuss in class.
The New Yorker Magazine has a whole archive of articles on the Iraq. It used
to have one on 9/11 but you may have to search for it. I expect you to
read some of them and discuss them in class.
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/
Another starting point for our discussion on Iraq, democracy, dual containement, Economics of War, Oil and other issues can be found in the Atlantic Monthly Magazine at:
Week Two: Library visit in a lab visit if possible
Deadline for your paper topic/country of study is June 1st. You also need
to give me an outline/proposal. This should have the main objective of your
paper and clearly explain your thesis and your methodology. The proposal should
also have an initial bibliography.
Continue viewing the case studies on Iraq and material on the Economics of
War.
Truths, Wars and Consequences
The Man Who Knew
Gulf War (parts 1 and 2)
The Saudi Question and others as time permit
At the end of each case study that is viewed in class, you are expected to
hand in a one page hand written commentary on what you watched. This should
be an analysis/critique/raising questions on what you just observed.
Week Three: Overview of the main issues affecting the Middle East and
North Africa, lectures and discusion
Discussion of the case studies and the articles. These will be assigned and
each student will be responsible for one article/chapter from Alan Richards'
Book to be discussed in class.
Oil, Islam and Politics in the Middle East. US and West dependence on it and
what should be done?
Economic Development in the region, Global currency crisis and regional impact
Week Four:
Presentations by students, Discussion of current events and articles
Week Five: Continue presentation by students, discussion of chapters
and articles
Papers due on Monday June 27th, 2005
Grading:
Each student will have to complete the following:
1. A major paper on the country(ies) or region.The paper should be no more than 15 pages.
Each student will do one project. The paper needs to emphasize the economic
policy aspects-and political and religious when necessary but the emphasis
should be on the economic analysis- and be analytical and NOT descriptive.
What the major econmic problems facing your country? How did it face them?
What sorts of economic policy (ies) were followed to address them? What would
you recommend? You need to have a clear paper backed up by data and very good
sources. Relying on Web sources only will not do. You need to have a solid
list of resources such as scholarly articles, books, reports, etc... If need
be, your paper will address the different issues facing the given country
(economic, social, religious, political, military etc...) and produces an
outlook for the future (not necessarily a forecast). Given the region under
study, you may choose to do something on oil and its importance to the region
and the world economy. Dependence on oil by the region is also a topic worthy
of consideration. The paper will count for 40% of your grade. Remember,
you need to make sure that your paper is well written, complete with references
and footnotes and a bibliography. Do not merely summarize what reports already
written by others. You need to have a theme, argue your case and come with
policy recommendations. If you need help, consult. All papers will be submitted
to Turnitin.com. You should submit a paper copy AND a disk or a CD with both
your presenation AND your paper on it by June 27th or before. Late paper will
be graded down by one letter grade.
2. By June 2nd, each student should hand in a typed two or
three page outline/proposal for their topic. This should include a detailed
outline, thesis, methodology and data sources. These should NOT be all web
sources.
A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations,
by Kate. L. Turabian,
Please consult. Failure to have a proper bibliography will reduce your grade.
As mentioined earlier, all papers will be uploaded to Turnitin.com. Remember that plagiarism is a serious offense and it will be reported to the Honor's Code office as well as to the Dean's office. Check the policy on this issue at:
http://www.colorado.edu/policies/acadinteg.html
Please note that not all papers will be given an A. The grade distribution
will be as follows:
Grade 100% scale
A 93.4-100
A- 90.0-93.3
B+ 86.7-89.9
B 83.4-86.6
B- 80.0-83.3
C+ 76.7-79.9
C 73.4-76.6
C- 70.0-73.3 =
D+ 66.7-69.9
D 63.4-66.6
D- 60.0-63.3
F less than 60
3 . Attendance and class participation both in class will
count toward the final grade. Attendance means being in class on time. Being
late will count as absent. Not having read the assignments for the day will
count as an F for that component of the course. We will be discussing different
current issues, news articles, current events etc... It will be our virual
classroom. The class participation will count for 20% of your grade, mostly
on class discussion, material that you find and bring to class for discussion
etc... Asking questions does not consitute class participation. You have to
be fully engaged and show that you are keeping up with the material and have
read it and comment/critique it. Attendance will count for 15%. However, not
being in class will automatically be reflected in a lack of attendance.
4. Prior to finishing your final paper, you will have to make a presentation and get feedback from the class. Based on the comments from the class and myself, you will be able to put the finishing touches on your paper. The presentation has be comprehensive. By that, I mean you are expected to present your thesis, your findings, predictions, what you learned from the project etc... I highly suggest that you bring in a detailed outline to be presented to the class, as well as encourage you to use transparencies if need be. We will work out a schedule during the first week of classes. The presentation will count for 10%.
5. There is will be a short quizz which will
count for 15% on July 1st and the material to be covered will be given to
you in class early enough.
Remember that this is subject to change. New material will be assigned as
it becomes available and the order of coverage may change as events dictate.