Colonialism and After

15 credits
Autumn teaching, Year 1

This module is an introduction to a range of key historical problems and conceptual questions relating to the colonial and postcolonial experiences. Focusing on the characteristics of capitalism, imperialism, and modernity, the module examines the making of the modern world. It provides an introduction to European expansion, the slave economy, the development of wage labour, industrial growth, imperialism, creation of the modern state, genocide, the idea of development, anticolonialism, and the creation of the `third world'.

Concepts in Development

15 credits
Autumn teaching, Year 1

The module will provide a foundation to the study of international development, providing an explanation of key concepts in development studies by drawing on the first hand research experiences of international development faculty. Each week, a concept will be explored and illustrated through examples from the research experience of Sussex lecturers discussing 'real places', and 'real issues'. You will be introduced to the diversity of approaches to defining and understanding development through interrogation of concepts such as 'globalisation', 'war', 'aid', 'states', 'markets', 'community' and 'civil society'.

Institutions of Aid

15 credits
Spring teaching, Year 1

This module will enable you to interrogate the changing relationships between the different institutions involved in international
aid and development. Apparent consensus about the aims and objectives of aid is manifested in instruments such as the Millennium
Development Goals and international agreements concerning aid harmonisation. But behind this apparent consensus is a complex -
and changing - range of institutions, with different histories, interests and incentives. Focusing each week on a different institution or
set of institutions, the module will explore the factors shaping contemporary aid practices. Institutions covered will include: the
multilateral development banks and the United Nations agencies; official bilateral agencies, including so called 'emerging' donors; and
the widening range of private and non-governmental actors.

International Development: Ideas and Actors

15 credits
Autumn teaching, Year 1

This module offers an introduction to key ideas and actors in international development. It begins by considering what the term "development" means, exploring a range of different interpretations and the different kinds of practices that are associated with the idea of development. It goes on to look at trends in development thinking, and from there to identify a series of ideas and actors who have been influential in shaping international development thinking, policy and practice. By looking at the kinds of ideas about development associated with different kinds of actors, and at debates about aid, development and social change, the module will give you an overview of the field of international development and put in place some of the foundations for subsequent development modules.

Issues in Development

15 credits
Spring teaching, Year 1

The aim of the module is to provide you with an overview of international development using key topics to explore the different theoretical and conceptual perspectives that underpin understandings of development. The module is not a comprehensive review of all development-related issues but instead focuses on a smaller set of issues in development, covering amongst other matters, topics of poverty, international trade, growth, population, environment, aid and debt.

Key Thinkers in Development

15 credits
Spring teaching, Year 1

This module provides an introduction to some of the most important thinkers in international development. It provides a broad historical overview of the evolution of development thinking by starting with key debates initiated in the 18th and 19th centuries and moving to contemporary thinkers from diverse geographical regions. Each week, you will read an original text from the key thinker discussed, as well as an additional supporting/critical text. Above all else the module aims to provide you with a broad understanding of different approaches to development thinking, why they arose and their current applicability in the age of globalisation.

Economic Perspectives on Development

15 credits
Autumn teaching, Year 2

This module introduces you to how economics can be used to understand contemporary international development issues. You will obtain a basic understanding of tools that economics uses to analyse and evaluate development questions. The emphasis is on analysing a topic and the nature of the problem, and policy responses, from both an economic and critical perspective. The module begins with a non-technical introduction to economics and then covers a set of topics, such as determinants of economic growth and the connection between growth, inequality and poverty, trade and trade policy, poverty reduction policies, the roles of corruption, legal and political institutions in economic development, agriculture, land and credit markets, the determinants and consequences of violent conflict and environment and development.

Research Skills for Development

15 credits
Autumn teaching, Year 2

This module is an introduction to the research methods, techniques and skills used in development research and provides a foundation for the International Development thesis in the third year. The module is taught through workshops during which you focus on practical issues to do with research skills, as well as consider some of the more abstract issues that inform how we do research. The module encourages you to think about research ethics and the linkages between project design and methods of data collection.

Social Change, Culture and Development

15 credits
Autumn teaching, Year 2

This module starts from the observation that development is more than economic change and involves important social and cultural aspects. It begins with an interrogation of the way development practices and ideas are embedded in cultural contexts, and specifically how the development industry is historically and culturally entangled in Western conceptions of progress, rationality, and the individual. Against a view of culture as 'tradition' and an impediment to development we will examine different cultural conceptions of progress. This involves both alternate visions of future development as well as the negative impacts that development policies and interventions have on local people, communities and cultures. Questions of power and cultural relativism inevitably arise: what happens when different interests and commitments collide, and who or what determines the module development interventions take?

Development and the State

15 credits
Spring teaching, Year 2

This module is concerned with the role of the state in development. It considers this subject matter  theoretically - that is, by exploring debates in state theory, and on the relationship between the state and development - empirically, by investigating a range of historical and contemporary state forms and the impacts of these state forms on processes of development, and normatively, by posing questions about what the nature and role of the state should ideally be.

The module examines the main theoretical approaches to the state and historical state forms and their attendant development experiences, in the north and in the post-colonial south. Finally, the module moves to development since the 1980s, exploring the impacts of state failure, neo-liberalism, democratisation and global governance on state forms and patterns of development.

Environmental Perspectives on Development

15 credits
Spring teaching, Year 2

The module explores development with an explicit focus on environmental issues. You will look at the relationships between development and the environment: the consequences of development on the environment, environmental constraints to development, and problems of development in marginal environments. You will examine how the environment and issues around sustainability have been considered (or ignored) in relation to development and how this has changed over time. The module includes historical perspectives on environment and development, illustrating continuities and changes in policies related to environment and development. It also explores core issues around environmental management and development in relation to key resources, such as wildlife, forests and water.

Finance for Development

15 credits
Spring teaching, Year 2

This module discusses and analyses the major challenges and current initiatives in the creation of finance industries appropriate to and effective in developing countries. The module focuses on the private financial sector and issues relating to access to finance. After a general overview, the module begins by examining the forms of finance available for larger firms in developing countries, mainly the banking sector and the stock market. Subsequently, it covers the evidence on the effects of financial development on economic growth and the role of institutional factors, such as corporate governance, in financial development. It then moves on to examine the access to finance for smaller firms and households and the implications of a lack of access. Finally, the module touches upon private international sources of finance, namely private capital flows, FDI and remittances to developing countries.

Gender and Development: Theory, Concepts and Issues

15 credits
Spring teaching, Year 2

This module considers development processes in the light of how they are shaped by and impact upon gender discourses and relations. The module introduces you to key concepts in the analysis of social relations between women and men in different cultural, economic and political contexts. This includes examining the nature of gender inequality and of the household as a social construct, and reviewing concepts of power and empowerment. While concerned with providing a theoretical and conceptual grounding by reviewing debates on the household and the gender division of labour, the module is organised around substantive and policy topics related to poverty, labour markets, women’s employment, migration, and globalisation.

Health, Poverty and Inequality

15 credits
Spring teaching, Year 2

This second year interdisciplinary module is concerned with issues of culture, power and knowledge in the study of health and development. It draws on perspectives from medical anthropology, medical sociology, public health, cultural psychology, feminist and activist politics and development studies to focus on the relationship between poverty, social marginality and illness in a variety of historical and contemporary contexts. Apart from a focus on emerging infectious diseases such as HIV and Aids, we also consider the implications of homelessness, mental health and organ donation for individual health and well-being. The scrutiny of health planning and policies, such as in the domain of maternal and child health, as well as the impact of an increasing intervention of medical technologies in healthcare delivery, are further important aspects of the module.

Race, Ethnicity and Nationalism

15 credits
Spring teaching, Year 2

This module is an introduction to various themes and conceptual issues in the study of culture, ethnicity and nationalism as seen from a range of disciplinary perspectives. The module is comprised of three sections and is designed to provide you with an understanding of the interaction between power and cultural meanings, particularly as they relate to the construction of boundaries and the creation of difference between social groups. After considering such key concepts as race, culture, ethnicity, and nationalism, there will be an emphasis on ethnic and religious mobilisation and we shall consider the extent to which similar and different processes are at work in South Africa, the Caribbean, and the Indian sub-continent. These cases are included to give students a contextualised understanding of the complex historical and cultural dimensions of modern political struggles.

Work Placement (International Development)

60 credits
Autumn & spring teaching, Year 2

This module is designed to allow you to gain practical work experience in an area of relevance to your degree programme, as well as carrying out a supervised project that builds on research or practical skills learned in the first three terms of the degree. It takes the form of a 12-week international work placement, to be undertaken during the second teaching block of the second year. A limited number of placements will be available, in development and other international organisations, NGOs and businesses, and students will be selected for them on a competitive basis.

International Development Thesis

30 credits
Autumn & spring teaching, Year 3

The International Development Undergraduate Thesis provides you with an opportunity to integrate what they have learnt in the module of your studies into a single, sustained piece of writing that will explore a topic in depth. The module will involve the design, planning and execution of the thesis, with the support of a supervisor, and may include the collection of empirical data or the use of secondary source material. You choose your own topics, and develop your own approaches to investigating the topic, drawing on earlier skills-based modules and on interests developed through the module of the degree programme.

Conflict, Violence and Peace: Critical perspectives

30 credits
Spring teaching, Year 3

In recent years, there has been increased focus on conflict, violence and peace-building in the media, popular literature and aid programmes raising important questions about how these processes are understood and represented and what implications this has for the local and international response and in turn the transformation of conflict and violence. This module will offer critical perspectives on mainstream approaches to the study of conflict, violence and peace drawing on both anthropology and development studies.

Contemporary Issues in the Global Political Economy

30 credits
Autumn teaching, Year 3

The central theme running through this module is how the architecture of existing capitalism has to be adjusted or brought into balance with the needs of expanding markets. We begin by looking at attempts by global governance institutions like the WTO (World Trade Organisation) to create a largely deregulated world market. We then examine how financial systems are expanding and how the stock market has become a key institution of modern capitalism. We discuss then the changing nature of multinational corporations and the state as they reorient themselves towards a global market. We examine empirically the post-Cold War expansion of capitalism into Eastern Europe, Central Asia and the Middle East. Finally, we analyse the most recent developments in world affairs from a political economy perspective, looking at the increasing military bias of foreign policy of major capitalist states, as well as at the changing nature of anti-capitalist protest in the wake of 9/11.

Contemporary Issues in the Global Political Economy: in-depth Analysis

30 credits
Spring teaching, Year 3

The central theme running through this module is how the architecture of existing capitalism has to be adjusted or brought into balance with the needs of expanding markets. We begin by looking at attempts by global governance institutions like the WTO to create a largely deregulated world market. We then examine how financial systems are expanding and how the stock market has become a key institution of modern capitalism. We discuss then the changing nature of multinational corporations and the state as they reorient themselves towards a global market. We examine empirically the post-Cold War expansion of capitalism into Eastern Europe, Central Asia and the Middle East. Finally, we analyse the most recent developments in world affairs from a political economy perspective, looking at the increasing military bias of foreign policy of major capitalist states, as well as at the changing nature of anti-capitalist protest in the wake of 9/11.

Development, Business and Corporate Social Responsibility

30 credits
Spring teaching, Year 3

This module explores the role of business in development and the rise of the corporate social responsibility (CSR) movement. In recent years, the private sector, and transnational corporations (TNCs) in particular, have become increasingly important players in the development process. The business and development movement has emerged as part of the dramatic rise of CSR over the past decade - providing a new vision for the role of business in society as 'corporate citizen'. Development institutions, such as DFID and the UN, as well as global NGOs, have become increasingly interested in mobilising business, not only as donors, but as partners in development. At the same time, ethical trading initiatives, the fairtrade movement and pro-poor enterprise models offer opportunities, in different ways, for harnessing the power of the market in the service of development. This module will explore a number of key questions concerning the role of business in development and the rise of the CSR movement, from the perspective of both its proponents and opponents.

Environment, Ecology and Development

30 credits
Spring teaching, Year 3

This module examines the impact of social and economic transformations, trade and technological development on people, environment and ecology in the tropics. The analysis includes a historical perspective, present-day impacts and future scenarios. Topics include problems of water and energy supply and their health and environmental consequences; indigenous environmental knowledge; intellectual property rights and biotechnology; local and national perspectives on wildlife, ecotourism and environmental protection.

Ethnographies of Aid

30 credits
Autumn teaching, Year 3

This module considers what could be called the 'ethnographic turn' in development studies, which brings ethnographic methods and perspectives to bear on aid institutions, policies, and actors. These include particular methodological approaches, such as participant observation within aid organisations or 'expert' communities, attention to neglected dimensions such as the material culture of aid, and the role of the body in development work. In addition to the ethnography of policy making, we will also investigate the role of non-official materials such as aid worker blogs, memoirs, and 'development blockbusters'.

Human Rights

30 credits
Spring teaching, Year 3

This module focuses less on human rights rules and laws than on the assumptions of human rights, the historical context and issues around their operation and implementation. It draws from a new and growing literature on the sociology and anthropology of human rights which seeks to move beyond the assumptions of legal positivism (rights as being 'read off' from lists of human rights covenants) in order to develop the legal realist argument which focuses upon the living law of the operation of courts, the police, and the everyday understandings which citizens give to notions such as truth, justice, and morality.

Medicines, Health and Development

30 credits
Spring teaching, Year 3

This module examines the relationship between health and development paying particular attention to the international role of the pharmaceutical industry, the globalisation of its operations and how medical drugs are assessed for safety and efficacy. It examines the degree to which the pharmaceutical industry represents a positive or negative force for health in the developing world, and the role of organisations such as WHO.

Population and Development

30 credits
Spring teaching, Year 3

This module examines the relationship between population issues and economic, social and environmental aspects of development. It introduces theoretical frameworks for analysing population change and assesses the consequences of population growth for food supplies and the environment at both global and local levels. It goes on to examine factors affecting the components of population change including fertility and mortality decline, changing sex ratios, the growth of megacities and international migration. Policies on health, family planning and migration are also discussed.

Rural Livelihoods in the Global South

30 credits
Spring teaching, Year 3

This module considers the varied nature of rural livelihood systems in developing countries. You consider changes in livelihoods through livelihood diversification and migration, and the interconnectedness of the global and the local in causing change in rural societies. The module explores the impact of different agents of change on livelihoods. This will include the role of non-governmental organisations, the impact of modern biotechnology and the effects of trade on livelihoods, amongst other important examples. The module draws primarily (though by no means exclusively) on evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa and India.