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11.945 Field Research Seminar: Comparative Industrial Development Policy Reform

11.945 Issues in Industrialization

Analysis of Field Research Findings: Comparative Industrial Development and

Policy Reform

Fall 1998

 

MIT 11.945 (3-0-9) Professor Meenu Tewari

T: 2:30-4:30 Room 3-405b, mtewari@mit.edu

Room 5-134 Office hours: T, R: 5:00-7:00

 

Course Objectives:

This course is designed for students who have already conducted field

research and are currently engaged in the process of analyzing their

findings and writing up their research. The course grounds the process of

analyzing students field research findings within a critical examination

of current debates and controversies surrounding issues of local

industrialization, regional economic development, labor market processes,

the informal economy and shifts in bureaucratic practices with respect to

local industrial development.

 

The themes examined include: the rise of regional industrial clusters,

export and domestic market performance, technical change, the social

construction of distribution networks, revitalization of inner city

neighborhoods through revised manufacturing and commercial policies aimed

at informal firms, labor market responses to industrial restructuring and

tightening immigration laws, and links between economic growth and

environmental protection policies. Based on focused readings (on average

one reading per session) and discussions of students research projects,

the course will mine the individual projects and readings to look for clues

to a more informed understanding of the social and political processes

surrounding the economic pressures facing firms, workers, and local

bureaucrats. It will examine the implications of this understanding for

policy responses aimed at improving incomes, deepening the human and social

capital of communities, and fostering diversified and locally rooted

economic growth. Comparisons across the individual student research

projects will also help shed light on the controversies and contradictions

inherent in this process of locally-based economic change.

 

The course is designed more as a workshop, and high levels of class

participation are required. Students must come prepared to discuss the

week s readings, as well as give feedback on each others research

projects. In the first half of the course students will complete three

short assignments. The second half of the course is built around the

preparation and discussion of each student s draft research paper. Grades

for the class will be based on the assignments, regular attendance of

class, involved participation in giving feedback on each others projects,

and the improvement in the quality of work and progress made over the

course of the semester.

 

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