30212

SoSe 20: Economic sociology and contemporary challenges of the European project

Markus Lange Christian von Scheve

Information for students

Important: This seminar will take place as an Online-Course. It will be taught using predominantly synchronous teaching formats.
Detailed information will be made available by the lecturer via Blackboard after the enrollment on Campus Management.
If you don’t have access to Campus Management or Blackboard but want to partake in the course, please write an e-mail to the lecturer.
Current Information about changes related to COVID-19 can be viewed at the Institute’s Website. close

Comments

In the seminar we will examine contemporary economic challenges in the European Union using relevant perspectives from economic sociology. The first step will be to reconstruct recent developments, in particular, the consequences of the financial and economic crisis of 2007-2009 for members of the European Union and the subsequent European sovereign debt crisis. If cross-border economic cohesion and integration of markets and trade relations are among the founding principles of the European idea, to what extent have they been challenged or questioned by recent crises? For example, the case of Greece or the Brexit referendum can be examined in more detail. In a second step, relevant perspectives of (newer) economic sociology are reviewed, discussed, and prepared for application to the case of Europe, for example: the social embeddedness of economic action (e.g. social networks), dimensions concerning the social order of markets (e.g. competition, cooperation, economic value), the role of conventions, socio-technical arrangements, or the financialization of other societal areas (e.g. of statehood). Building on this, the aim is to interpret challenges of the European project from an economic-sociological angle. Thus, the seminar imparts knowledge about a ‘Europe in crisis’ as well as basic perspectives in economic sociology. close