Fair Trade, Ethical Business & New Moral Economies (845L6)

30 credits, Level 7 (Masters)

Spring teaching

Where and under what conditions are our T-shirts produced? How does Fair Trade impact on the livelihoods of small farmers in the Global South? Is Corporate Social Responsibility just a marketing ploy? Has ethics become only a matter of personal consumption behaviour?

Through an interdisciplinary approach, you will explore the role of markets and business in development, from multinational corporations, to small enterprise, to those labouring in the informal economy.

You'll explore the rise of corporate social responsibility, fair trade, civil society activism and ethical consumption practices as major new initiatives which attempt to make markets ethical, promote labour rights and offer market-based solutions to problems of poverty and under-development.

Contact hours and workload

This module is approximately 300 hours of work. This breaks down into about 33 hours of contact time and about 267 hours of independent study. The University may make minor variations to the contact hours for operational reasons, including timetabling requirements.

We regularly review our modules to incorporate student feedback, staff expertise, as well as the latest research and teaching methodology. We’re planning to run these modules in the academic year 2023/24. However, there may be changes to these modules in response to feedback, staff availability, student demand or updates to our curriculum. We’ll make sure to let you know of any material changes to modules at the earliest opportunity.