From: Economic and Political Development Concentration
Date: January 8
Subject: Spring EPD courses with available seats


Dear EPDers,

We hope you've been enjoying your well-deserved winter break! We wanted to share with you a list of spring EPD courses with available seats and in particular, highlight a new short course, Innovations in Development Finance, which will be taught by SIPA/EPD alumna Radha Kulkarni, who currently serves as the Innovative Finance Lead in UNICEF's Innovative Finance Hub. Radha has held several other positions in UNICEF and UNDP, and previously worked in management consulting and philanthropy in India. Radha also received SIPA's Emerging Leader Award at SIPA's Alumni Day in spring 2023. 

We would like to encourage any student interested in taking Advanced Economic Development (U8145) with Prof. Eric Verhoogen to enroll in his class this semester as Prof. Verhoogen will be on leave next year (and a different instructor will teach his course). 

Those looking to fulfill their political dimensions of sustainable development core requirement for EPD are encouraged to enroll in Prof. Nay's Political Development (U6189). Prof. Nay is a visiting professor from Universite Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne who taught with us a few years ago. Students really enjoyed his course then, and we're thrilled to have him teach with us again this spring. 

Finally, for students enrolled or interested in Prof. Benjamin Kumpf's course on Innovation for Development in Practice U6183 initially scheduled on 2/3 & 2/4, 2/10 & 2/11 and 2/17 & 2/18, please note that the class dates have changed to 3/23 & 3/24, 3/30 & 3/31 and 4/6 & 4/7. 

EPD Core Courses (with openings): 

INAF U6189 Political Development Instructor: Olivier Nay Monday, 4:10 - 6:00 PM Call #: 14137 
The course will provide participants with analytical perspectives and arguments from the social sciences so that they can better understand and analyze political development both as a process of historical transformation and, in the post-colonial world order, as a set of international policies influenced by great powers and international institutions. The course will also explore practical implications for policymaking. Throughout the course, participants will acquire general knowledge regarding concepts, theoretical backgrounds in social sciences, and the main debates guiding international policies. The course will also help participants grasp emerging issues in the field, such as the hybridity of political orders, the question of the resilience of societies, the emergence of new post-colonial political dynamics with the growing influence of the BRICS countries, and the question of environmental politics from a global perspective.

INAF U6602 Economic Development for International Affairs Instructor: Andrew Simons Section 1: Thursday, 11:00 - 12:50 PM Call #: 10236 Section 2: Thursday, 2:10 - 4:00 PM Call #: 10237
The course has two objectives: 1) to explore how economics can be used to understand development and 2) to provide tools and skills useful in policy work. In the course we will describe the basic facts surrounding the development process, and use economic theory to make sense of these facts and to identify gaps in our understanding. We will also learn about the toolkit of development economists that are used to fill in those gaps. These will include analyzing real world data and thinking in terms of causality and its relevance for policy. INAF U8145 Advanced Economic Development for International Affairs Instructor: Eric Verhoogen (NOTE: Prof. Verhoogen will be on leave in 2024-25 so students who wish to take a class with him should enroll this semester) Section 1: Thursday, 9:00 - 10:50 AM Call#: 10245 Section 2: Thursday, 2:10 - 4:00 PM Call#: 10246 Pre-requisite: SIPA U6400 (students who haven't taken U6400 but are comfortable with higher level math and/or have strong background in economics are encouraged to enroll in this course. Please reach out to Prof. Verhoogen if this applies to you and request a permission to be enrolled by OSA). 
This is an advanced course in development economics, designed for SIPA students interested in rigorous, applied training. Coursework includes extensive empirical exercises, requiring programming in Stata. The treatment of theoretical models presumes knowledge of calculus. Topics include: the economics of growth; the relationship between growth and poverty and inequality; rural-urban migration; the interaction between agrarian institutions in land, labor, credit, and insurance markets; prisoner’s dilemmas and the environment; and policy debates around development strategies. Recurrent themes: Are markets efficient, and if not, in what specific ways are they inefficient? What are the forces driving development and underdevelopment? What are the causal links between poverty and inequality and economic performance? What is the role of interventions by states or civil organizations in bringing about development? The course will integrate theoretical ideas and empirical analysis, with an emphasis on questions relevant for economic policy.

EPD Focus Area Courses (with openings):

INAF U6163 African Development Strategies: Policies, Institutions and Governance Instructor: Akbar Noman Wednesday, 2:10 – 4:00 PM Call #: 10233
This course focuses on economic development in Sub-Saharan Africa from a political economy perspective. It is divided into three sections. The first section examines the broad economic trends, policies and strategies of the past 50 years. The Washington Consensus and the lost decades are examined in some detail. The focus of this part is on economic growth and structural change, notably the controversies around economic policies and institutions. In the second section the course turns to socioeconomic dimensions and aspects of development including poverty, inequality, employment, health, education, and gender. The final section concludes with an examination of the implications of climate change, debates around foreign aid and an overview of what we have learned.

INAF U6205 Technopolitics, Democracy and Development
Instructor: Timothy Mitchell
Tuesday, 4:10-6:00pm
Call #: 18364
Development is a field of expertise that has often been vulnerable to political challenge and intellectual uncertainty. Forms of technical and economic knowledge that claim to master the present and provide a path to the future repeatedly turn out to be speculative, misguided, or damaging. Today, however, the situation seems more serious. The planetary problems of human-induced climate change, depletion of fossil energy reserves, and instability of financial systems have placed in question many of the foundations on which modern development knowledge was based.  This course begins by considering alternative ways to think about technology and politics, then explores a series of cases of technological uncertainty to examine their potential for generating new ways of thinking about and practicing democracy. A particular focus of this year's course will be financial technologies and the politics of debt. 

INAF U6303 Selected Topics in Financial Inclusion: Enhancing Financial Access for the Poor (short course) Instructors: Camilla Nestor and Louise Schneider-Moretto Monday, 6:10 - 8:00 PM Call #: 14138 Course dates: 3/18 - 4/29
While microfinance institutions remain a leading model for providing financial services to the poor, new models and technology developments have provided opportunities for scaling outreach, improving the range of products and services, deepening penetration and moving beyond brick and mortar delivery channels. The course will provide an overview of financial inclusion, with a focus on several foundational areas and select topics of current interest, including leading-edge digital financial services, gender, and innovative financial product design.

INAF U6658 Politics and Policies in South Asia  Instructor: Rumela Sen Monday, 2:10 - 4:00 PM Call #: 10240  This seminar is an advanced introduction to contemporary South Asia, one of the world’s most diverse regions. The course is open to SIPA students interested in the region, even if they do not have any prior background in South Asia. The readings will also cater to those students who know more about the region, but want to deepen their knowledge about predominant social, political, and economic issues in the politics and policymaking of South Asia. In this course we will look into various aspects of interaction of the state, society and market in South Asia with an aim to evaluate (a) how comparative social science illuminates South Asia and (b) how analysis of specific cases in South Asia contributes to general theorizing about politics. The focus of the course is analytical. We will use the South Asian experience to address some of the central questions in politics and policymaking.
INAF U6736 Innovations in Development Finance (short course) Instructor: Radha Kulkarni Course dates: Fri/Sat, Jan 26 & 27, Feb 2 & 3, Feb 9 &10 (Fridays: 11 - 1:20pm, Saturdays 10:30-12:50pm) Call #: 14143 The aspirations outlined in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development are in jeopardy as the world faces cascading and interrelated global crises and conflicts. It has become increasingly apparent that traditional funding modalities are falling tragically short to meet the financing requirements in addressing the SDGs - currently estimated to be around US$4.2 trillion per year. Hence, there is an urgent need to leverage alternative and innovative sources for financing development initiatives. This course will explore the intersection of development finance, strategy, and policy. It will examine the landscape of traditional development financing, provide an overview of various innovative development financing mechanisms, and reflect on the process for adapting them in particular contexts. The course will be highly interactive, involving six classes taking place over three weekends, with leading experts as guest speakers, and practical activities including an individual opinion piece, a group project and presentation, and a simulation exercise. 
INAF U6774 Public Policy and Inequality in Developing Countries Instructor: Marcelo Medeiros Coelho de Souza Section 1: Thursday, 2:10 - 4:00 PM Call #: 10242 Section 2: Thursday, 4:10-6:00 PM Call #: 14141
A proper development strategy must be inclusive and sustainable. Policies to fight poverty, alleviate all inequalities, and promote social mobility are the focus of this course. It deals with emerging and persistent issues in developing countries: the design of a social safety net, biodiversity and sustainability, education, gender and racial inequalities, public health, labor policies, fiscal and social responsibility, the distributive aspects of fiscal policy, taxation, and government size and efficiency. The course combines problem-based learning and lectures.

INAF U6914 Policies and Practices in Human-Centered Digital Development Instructors: Savita Bailur  Friday, 11:00 – 12:50 PM Call #: 10719
The course takes a theoretical and critical look at the field from the instructor’s many years of experience working in technology and development, from organizations as diverse as Microsoft Research India to UN Women. ICTs have the power to fundamentally transform the lives of billions. Yet technological solutions are often offered as a “silver bullet”, not grounded in broader socio-economic networks. The course will discuss several case-studies in order to ground theory in practice, and will introduce students to several initiatives which have enabled “development” through ICTs, such as India’s Aadhaar, Kenya’s M-Pesa and others. We will also have participation from invited guest speakers. Through a group assignment, students will apply the principles and good practices explored in the course to develop a concrete digital development proposal. Students who are interested in careers in international development with a focus on technology will find this course a useful foundation.

Best wishes,
The EPD Team