We have come a long way since Francis Fukuyama confidently proclaimed "the end of history" thirty years ago. Today’s world is in considerable turmoil. Rising inequality and precarity, economic and environmental crises, populism, political upheaval, and war seem to characterize our time.

This two-part course examines social inequalities and conflicts with an emphasis on their embeddedness in space and the environment. Topics include urban protest, "left-behind places," and unequal exchange between the Global North and the Global South. The aim of the course is to gain an understanding of inequality and current conflicts, in order to assess the potential for policy intervention.

This is the second part of the course which focuses on the supervised development of a research project based on the content of the first part. While the two parts are assessed separately, they should be interpreted as an integrated unit.

At the end of this course, students should acquire the following outcomes:

• Design and implement an (empirical) research project related to a topic on inequality
• Develop an in-depth understanding of your particular topic the social inequalities and conflicts
• Critical empirical implementation of core concepts and themes related to a topic on social inequality, conflicts and the role of space.
• Contextualisation of economic approaches and policies towards social inequality and conflicts
• Strengthen research skills
• Improve team work skills

The course will mainly consist of supervised group projects where students are required to present their progress regularly.

There are three portions to students’ grades:
•    Presenting and discussing the project at different stages of its development - 30%
•    Peer feedback - 10%
•    Final Group Paper - 60%

Grading rubric:

1: 90+ points

2: 75-89 points

3: 60-74 points

4: 50-59 points

5: 0-49 points

Please log in with your WU account to use all functionalities of read!t. For off-campus access to our licensed electronic resources, remember to activate your VPN connection connection. In case you encounter any technical problems or have questions regarding read!t, please feel free to contact the library at readinglists@wu.ac.at.