"Advanced Urban Public Finance: Collective Action and Provisions of Local Public Goods, Spring 2009"

Abstract:: " In analyzing fiscal issues, conventional public finance approaches focus mainly on taxation and public spending. Policymakers and practitioners rarely explore solutions by examining the fundamental problem: the failure of interested parties to act collectively to internalize the positive externalities generated by public goods. Public finance is merely one of many possible institutional arrangements for assigning the rights and responsibilities to public goods consumption. This system is currently under stress because of the financial crisis. The first part of the class will focus on collective action and its connection with local public finance. The second part will explore alternative institutional arrangements for mediating collective action problems associated with the provision of local public goods. The objective of the seminar is to broaden the discussion of local public finance by incorporating collective action problems into the discourse. This inclusion aims at exploring alternative institutional arrangements for financing local public services in the face of severe economic downturn. Applications of emerging ideas to the provision of public health, education, and natural resource conservation will be discussed."

"Ethnic and National Identity, Fall 2009"

Abstract:: "An introduction to the cross-cultural study of ethnic and national identity. We examine the concept of social identity, and consider the ways in which gendered, linguistic, religious, and ethno-racial identity components interact. We explore the history of nationalism, including the emergence of the idea of the nation-state, as well as ethnic conflict, globalization, identity politics, and human rights."

Abstract:: Family life is continuously changing in many ways. This unit looks at the change, or lack of change, in the role of women and men in the home. The discussion of this topic will focus on the connectedness between women’s work in the paid labour force and their work in the home. In addition, underlying this will be our recognition that family life today is characterised by diversity.