This course gives a systematic introduction into socioeconomics: a research perspective that emphasizes the economy’s embeddedness in society and, by extension, nature. After defining socioeconomics and linking it with similar approaches (political economy, economic sociology, social-ecological economics), the embeddedness paradigm is introduced as a framework for socioeconomic research and developed with regard to understandings of actors, relations, institutions, systems, and rationalities. To demonstrate the added value and distinctiveness of socioeconomic research perspectives, the course revisits central institutions of modern capitalist systems, including the market, the state, law, work and money, whose workings and meanings are explored going beyond formal definitions. Building on this, the discussion turns to complex institutional constellations: the socioeconomic regimes of affluent countries, with a focus on their internal trade-offs and externalities as well as their interactions and transformations in the context of economic integration.

This course complements other courses in the introductory and main program phases of the BBE program ('Contemporary Challenges in Business and Economics', 'Foundations in Micro- and Macroeconomics', 'History of Economics and the Economy'), by offering an integrative account of the economy and its manifold institutions, which is informed by different social scientific disciplines and approaches.

After successfully completing this course, students will be able to distinguish socioeconomic approaches from the models and applications of standard economics. They will be able to give a substantive account of the economy, which brings out the social relations, institutional frameworks, and webs of meaning, in which economic activities are enmeshed. They will be able to enumerate key institutions on which our economic system rests, describe their properties from a socioeconomic point of view, and discuss whether these institutions are themselves imbued with economic thinking. They will be able to analyze contemporary socioeconomic regimes, explain their institutional and material preconditions, outline their development in recent decades, and discuss their viability in the future. By compiling, comparing and integrating information from different sources and research perspectives, they will improve their reading and research skills. By discussing contents and structuring presentations in collaboration with peers, they will refine their ability for academic teamwork.

If Covid restrictions are still in place in the summer term 2022, this course will be held in a synchronous distance-learning format, with attendance rules being basically the same as in on-campus teaching. Students should be prepared that online quizzes may be accessible during class time only.

In this course, regular attendance is both assumed and recommended, and a condition to achieve a very good grade. However, the formal attendance requirement is reduced to 50%, and the course can also be successfully completed at this minimum level of attendance. Attendance as such will not be monitored, but in-class activities in the form of online quizzes add up to 15% of the total grade.

For the time being, on-campus teaching is planned. If there is still a need to switch to online learning in the summer term 2022 due to Covid restrictions, the course will be held in a synchronous distance-learning format. Please reserve the time-slots for participation as in on-campus teaching.

The course format is ‘lectures with interactive elements’, which means that in-class activities by the students, including quizzes, other exercises and discussions, play an important role next to presentations by the teacher. As contact hours formally only make for a sixth of the total workload, the course also includes a considerable share of out-of-class activities, including reading tasks for each lecture (2 to 10), group work expanding on the contents of one of the lectures (3 to 7) and preparations for the final exam. The electronic course platform will be used to distribute materials and collect the results of group work, including online presentations and peer feedback.

Grading is based on the following components: 

• Out-of-class preparation (reading and multimedia tasks): 20%
• Online quizzes on basics, institutions, and constellations (distributed over the whole semester): 20%
• Group work with peer assessment and multimedia presentation (complementing lectures 3-7): 30%
• Final exam (written exam; specific form, date and venue tba): 30%

The grading scheme is as follows:

≥ 90 % excellent (1)

≥ 80 % good (2)

≥ 70 % satisfactory (3)

≥ 60 % sufficient (4)

< 60 % fail (5) 

Important rules:

• There is no general opportunity to compensate for a missed group presentation with peer assessment. It is expected that the members of a group flexibly arrange the workload, so that they can deal with minor contingencies on their own. Only in exceptional, well-justified cases, the teacher may offer a second opportunity to do, or compensate for, a group presentation with peer assessment.
• Students who miss the final exam for reasons outside their control generally have to give notice to the lecturer by email before the exam starts. Reasons of absence have to be substantiated by suitable evidence as early as possible. Only in this case, students can take the exam on a later date to be specified by the teaching administration. This possibility is only given once. Moreover, students can retake a failed exam, if the student achieved at least 10% of the total points of the exam. Passed exams cannot be retaken.