MIT OPENCOURSEWARE 2011: NextLab I: Designing Mobile Technologies for the Next Billion users

NextLab I: Designing Mobile Technologies for the Next Billion Users

As taught in: Fall 2008

NextLab designs mobile technologies for the next billion users in developing countries.

Instructors:

Mr. Jhonatan Rotberg
Dr. Luis Sarmenta
Dr. Gari Clifford
Dr. Rich Fletcher

MIT Course Number:

MAS.965 / 6.976 / SP.716

Level:

Undergraduate / Graduate

Course Highlights

This course features over 100 videos, documenting the development of seven team-based projects, along with most class lectures and student-led discussions of assigned class readings.

Course Description

Can you make a cellphone change the world?
NextLab is a hands-on year-long design course in which students research, develop and deploy mobile technologies for the next billion mobile users in developing countries. Guided by real-world needs as observed by local partners, students work in multidisciplinary teams on term-long projects, closely collaborating with NGOs and communities at the local level, field practitioners, and experts in relevant fields.
Students are expected to leverage technical ingenuity in both mobile and internet technologies together with social insight in order to address social challenges in areas such as health, microfinance, entrepreneurship, education, and civic activism. Students with technically and socially viable prototypes may obtain funding for travel to their target communities, in order to obtain the first-hand feedback necessary to prepare their technologies for full fledged deployment into the real world (subject to guidelines and limitations).

Syllabus

This is NextLab

http://ocw.mit.edupage_url/

 

This video was produced

NEXT LAB VIDEO

and provided by nextlab via Vimeo, and is not covered under our Creative Commons license.

Lecture Videos

Videos, slides and other materials on individual projects can be found on the projects pages.

SES #	LECTURES AND CASE STUDIES	READINGS DISCUSSIONS
1	Introduction to NextLab Video and Slides
2	Proposal selection process (PDF) Project proposal presentations Video and Slides
3	Needs assessment (Guest lecture by Rachel Hall-Clifford) Video and Slides Team formation Video and Slides
4	Class logistics Video and Slides Planning ICT4D Interventions	Heeks. "ICT4D 2.0: The Next Phase of Applying ICT for International Development." Donner et al. "Stages of Design in Technology for Global Development." Pentland et al. "DakNet: rethinking connectivity in developing nations." Video and Slides by Michael Gordon
5	Economic and social conditions Technology survey / ICT penetration	Banerjee and Duflo. "The Economic Lives of the Poor." Video and Slides by Sreya Sengupta Jensen. "The Digital Provide: Information (Technology), Market Performance, and Welfare in the South Indian Fisheries Sector." Video and Slides by anonymous MIT student
6	Milestone 1: Elevator pitch, including related work
7	Social and cultural considerations (PDF)	Malink. "Design of Health Care Technologies for the Developing World." Video and Slides by Santiago Alfaro Caldwell. "Cultural and Social Factors Influencing Mortality Levels in Developing Countries." Video and Slides by Jon Varsanik
8	Milestone 1 continued
9	ICT4D history	Kumar. "eChoupals: A Study on the Financial Sustainability of Village Internet Centers in Rural Madhya Pradesh." Video and Slides by anonymous MIT student
10	Milestone 3 requirements Video and Slides Milestone 2: Presentations on needs assessment results
11	Milestone 2 results (continued)
12	Interfaces	Parishk et al. "Design studies for a financial management system for micro-credit groups in rural India." Slides by anonymous MIT student Parikh and Lazowa. "Designing an architecture for delivering mobile info services to rural developing world." Video and Slides by Oliver Wilder-Smith Mehdi et al. "Text-Free User Interfaces for Illiterate and Semiliterate Users." Video and Slides by Ted Chan Mehdi and Toyama. "Full-Context Videos for First-Time, Non-Literate PC Users." Video by Scot Frank
13	Two guest lectures: 1) An Introduction to the GSMA’s Mobile Innovation Market and Development Fund. (Guest lecture by Andy McGuire, GSMA.) 2) Microsoft Innovation Partnership Program (Guest lecture by Smeeta Hirani, Microsoft.) Video and Slides Milestone 3: Presentations on system design and initial implementation results
14	Health (PDF) (Courtesy of Gari Clifford. Used with permission.)	Clifford, G., et al. "Medical information systems: A foundation for healthcare technologies in developing countries." Video and Slides by anonymous MIT student Blaya et al. "A web-based laboratory information system to improve quality of care of tuberculosis patients in Peru: functional requirements, implementation and usage statistics." Video and Slides by anonymous MIT student Anantraman et al. "Handheld computers for rural healthcare: Experiences from research concept to global operations." Video and Slides by Crystal Mao Sherwani et al. "HealthLine: Speech-based Access to Health Information by Low-literate Users." Video and Slides by anonymous MIT student Fraser et al. "An information system and medical record to support HIV treatment in rural Haiti." Video and Slides by Clark Freifeld Malkin, "Technologies for clinically relevant physiological measurements in developing countries." Video and Slides by Sameer Hirji
15	Milestone 3 results (continued)
16	Disaster management Health (continued)	Szot et al. "Diagnostic Accuracy of Chest X-rays Using a Digital Camera for Low-Cost Teleradiology." Video and Slides by anonymous MIT student Plauché and Nallasamy. "Speech interfaces for equitable access to information technology." Video and Slides by Anastasios Dimas
17	Milestone 4: Sustainability and financial factors
18	Milestone 4 continued
19	Education	Leach. "DEEP IMPACT: an investigation of the use of information and communication technologies for teacher education in the global south." Video and Slides by Rashmi Melgiri Kam et al. "Localized iterative design for language learning in underdeveloped regions." Video and Slides by anonymous MIT student Kremer and Miguel. "Worms: Identifying Impacts on Health & Education in Presence of Treatment Externalites." Video and Slides by anonymous MIT student
20	Mobile money and transactions	Wishart. "Micro-Payment Systems and Their Application to Mobile Networks." Video and Slides by anonymous MIT student Vodafone and Nokia. "The Transformational Potential of M-Transactions." Video and Slides by anonymous MIT student Obopay Video by M. Ehsan Hoque
21	Milestone 5: Demo
22	Milestone 5 continued Nextlab Final Presentation Template Video
23	Milestone 6: Final presentation practice
24	Milestone 6 continued
25	Conclusion
26	Final presentation event Opening remarks by Jhonatan Rotberg and Luis Sarmenta Video For individual project presentations and demonstrations, see the Projects pages.

Readings

This page presents the complete reading list for the course.
Many of these papers were selected for in-class presentation and discussion by the students. Videos of these discussions and associated presentation slides are available through the lecture videos page, or by following the individual links provided in the following table.

Recommended Readings

Course readings.

READINGS	DISCUSSIONS
Session 4: planning ICT4D interventions
Donner, Jonathan, et al. "Stages of Design in Technology for Global Development." IEEE Computer 41, no. 6 (2008): 34-41.	Videos and slides
Heeks, Richard. "ICT4D 2.0: The Next Phase of Applying ICT for International Development." IEEE Computer 41, no. 6 (June 2008): 26-33.
Pentland, A., R. Fletcher, and A. Hassan. "DakNet: Rethinking Connectivity in Developing Nations." IEEE Computer 37, no. 1. (January 2004): 78-83. (PDF)
Hudelson, Patricia M. "Introduction," and "The Toolbox." Chapters 1 and 2 in Qualitative Research for Health Programmes. Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization, WHO/MNH/PSF/94.3, 1994. (PDF) (Pay particular attention to Chapter 2 section on focus groups.)
Varkevisser, Corlien M., Indra Pathmanathan, and Ann Templeton Brownlee. "Design of Research Instruments; Interview Guides and Interview Skills." Module 10B in Designing and Conducting Health Systems Research Projects 1, 2003.
Veeraraghavan, Rajesh, Naga Yasodhar, and Kentaro Toyama. "Warana Unwired: Replacing PCs with Mobile Phones in a Rural Sugarcane Cooperative." International Conference on Information & Communication Technologies for Development, Bangalore India, 2007.
Session 5: economic and social conditions
Banerjee, Abhijit V., and Esther Duflo. "The Economic Lives of the Poor." The Journal of Economic Perspectives 21, no. 1 (February 23, 2007): 141-167.	Video and slides
Jensen, Robert. "The Digital Provide: Information (Technology), Market Performance, and Welfare in the South Indian Fisheries Sector." The Quarterly Journal of Economics 122, no. 3 (2007): 879-924.	Video and slides
Karnani, Aneel G. "Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid: A Mirage." University of Michigan Ross School of Business Paper No. 1035. California Management Review (forthcoming). Available at SSRN.
Session 5: technology survery / ICT penetration
Horst, Heather, and Daniel Miller, eds. Selected chapters in The Cell Phone: An Anthropology of Communication. Oxford, NY: Berg Publishers, 2006. ISBN: 9781845204013. [Preview this book in Google Books.]
Session 7: social and cultural considerations
Caldwell, John C. "Cultural and Social Factors Influencing Mortality Levels in Developing Countries." The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 510, no. 1 (July 1, 1990): 44-59.	Video and slides
Malkin, Robert A. "Design of Health Care Technologies for the Developing World." Annual Review of Biomedical Engineering 9 (July 25, 2007): 567-587.	Video and slides
Wells, Stewart, and Chris Bullen. "A Near Miss: The Importance of Context in a Public Health Informatics Project in a New Zealand Case Study." Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association 15, no. 5, pp. 701-704.
Session 9: ICT4D history
Cohen, Nevin. "What Works: Grameen Telecom's Village Phones." A Digital Dividend Study by the World Resources Institute, June 2001. (PDF)
Kumar, Richa. "eChoupals: A Study on the Financial Sustainability of Village Internet Centers in Rural Madhya Pradesh." Information Technologies and International Development 2, no. 1 (2004): 45-74. (PDF)	Video and slides
Surana, Sonesh, et al. "Deploying a Rural Wireless Telemedicine System: Experiences in Sustainability." IEEE Computer 41, no. 6 (June 2008): 48-56.
Session 12: interfaces
Medhi, Indrani, and Kentaro Toyama. "Full-Context Videos for First-Time, Non-Literate PC Users." Presented at CHI 2007, San Jose, CA: ACM, 2007. (PDF)	Video
Medhi, Indrani, Aman Sagar, and Kentaro Toyama. "Text-Free User Interfaces for Illiterate and Semiliterate Users." Information Technologies and International Development 4, no. 1 (2007): 37-50. (PDF)	Video and slides
Parikh, Tapan, Kaushik Ghosh, and Apala Chavan. "Design Studies for a Financial Management System for Micro-credit Groups in Rural India." In Proceedings of the 2003 Conference on Universal Usability. Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada: ACM, 2003.	Video and slides
Parikh, Tapan S., and Edward D. Lazowska. "Designing an Architecture for Delivering Mobile Information Services to the Rural Developing World." In Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on World Wide Web. Edinburgh, Scotland: ACM, 2006.	Video and slides
Plauché, Madeline, and Udhyakumar Nallasamy. "Speech Interfaces for Equitable Access to Information Technology." Information Technologies and International Development 4, no. 1 (2007): 69-86. (PDF)	Video and slides
Session 14-16: health
Anantraman, V., et al. "Handheld Computers for Rural Healthcare: Experiences from Research Concept to Global Operations." Proceedings of Development by Design, 1-10. (PDF)	Video and slides
Blaya, J. A., et al. "A Web-based Laboratory Information System to Improve Quality of Care of Tuberculosis Patients in Peru: Functional Requirements, Implementation and Usage Statistics." BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making 7, no. 33 (2007). doi:10.1186/1472-6947-7-33. Formats: (full text HTML) (PDF - 1.0 MB)	Video and slides
Clifford, G. D., J. A. Blaya, R. Hall-Clifford, and H. S. F. Fraser. "Medical Information Systems: A Foundation for Healthcare Technologies in Developing Countries." BioMedical Engineering OnLine 7, no. 18 (2008). doi:10.1186/1475-925X-7-18. Formats: (full text HTML) (PDF)	Video and slides
Derenzi, Brian, et al. "e-IMCI: Improving Pediatric Health Care in Low-income Countries." CHI '08: Proceeding of the Twenty-sixth Annual SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2008, pp. 753-762. (PDF)
Fraser, H. S. F., et al. "An Information System and Medical Record to Support HIV Treatment in Rural Haiti." British Medical Journal 329 (2004): 1142-1146. Formats: (full text HTML) (PDF)	Video and slides
Malkin, Robert A. "Technologies for Clinically Relevant Physiological Measurements in Developing Countries." Physiol Meas 28 (2007): R57-R63. doi:10.1088/0967-3334/28/8/R01.	Video and slides
Sherwani, J., et al. "HealthLine: Speech-based Access to Health Information by Low-literate Users." In Proc. IEEE/ACM Int'l Conference on Information and Communication Technologies and Development, Bangalore, India, December 2007. (PDF)	Video and slides
Szot, A., et al. "Diagnostic Accuracy of Chest X-rays Acquired Using a Digital Camera for Low-Cost Teleradiology." Int J Med Inform 73 no. 1 (2004): 65-73. (PDF)	Video and slides
Session 19: education
Kam, Matthew, et al. "Localized Iterative Design for Language Learning in Underdeveloped Regions: the PACE Framework." In CHI '07: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. San Jose, CA: ACM, 2007, pp. 1097-1106. (PDF)	Video and slides
Kremer, Michael, and Edward Miguel. "Worms: Identifying Impacts on Health and Education in the Presence of Treatment Externalities." Poverty Action Lab, September, 2001. ( PDF)	Video and slides
Leach, Jenny, et al. Selected chapters in DEEP IMPACT: An Investigation of the Use of Information and Communication Technologies for Teacher Education in the Global South. Department for International Development, 2005. Full report: (PDF - 5.9 MB); executive summary: (PDF)	Video and slides
Session 20: mobile payments and transactions
Vodafone, Nokia, and Nokia-Siemens Networks. The Transformational Potential of M-Transactions, Policy Paper Series No. 6 (July 2007). (PDF)	Video and slides
Wishart, Neville. "Micro-Payment Systems and Their Application to Mobile Networks." InfoDev, January 2006.	Video and slides
Session 21: environment and other applications
Workshop on ICTs, the Environment and Climate Change. OECD and Danish Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation, National IT and Telecom Agency. Copenhagen, Denmark, 22-23 May 2008.
Supporting technical references
Li, S., and J. Knudsen. Beginning J2ME: From Novice to Professional. 3rd ed. Berkeley, CA: Apress, 2005. ISBN: 9781590594797. [Preview this book at Google Books.]
Course materials from MIT EPROM (Entrepreneurial Programming and Research on Mobiles).

 

Projects

Project Milestones

The project teams progressed through a sequence of seven milestones during the term. Presentation slides summarizing the milestone requirements are provided below for the first three milestones.

1. Elevator Pitch and Related Work (PDF)
2. Needs Assessments Initial Results (PDF)
3. System Design, and Initial Implementation Results (PDF)
4. Sustainability / Financial Factors
5. Feature Complete, General Progress Report
6. Working Demo
7. Final Presentation Event

Project Team Pages

From a longer list of potential projects, student teams worked on the following seven projects.  Each of the following links goes to a page presenting videos and slides of final results, as well as interim milestones and some supplemental project materials.

ECONOMIC EMPOWERMENT

Giving Farmers a Fighting Chance (with ITESM Zacatecas, Mexico)

Get New Money: Multilevel marketing for microfinance (with Cobiscorp Bank, Ecuador)

M-commerce (with United Villages, India)

HEALTH

MoCa: Mobile diagnostics for cervical cancer (with CIDRZ, Zambia)

EDUCATION

Fellows Forum: Mobile social network for students in low-income communities (with Telmex, Mexico)

ENVIRONMENT AND COMMUNITY

NextMap: Disaster Management (with CRS, India and InnovGreen, Vietnam)

Thrive in 5 Baby Blog (with Mayor’s Office, Boston)

 

Download Course Materials

This package contains the same content as the online version of the course.

For help downloading and using course materials, read our frequently asked questions.

31.71 MB

 

 

MIT OPEN COURSEWARE 2011: Applied Macro- and International Economics

Applied Macro- and International Economics

As taught in: Spring 2011

World map of GDP per capita based on 2008 IMF estimates. (Image courtesy of sbw01f on Wikipedia.)

Instructors:

Prof. Roberto Rigobon
Prof. Alberto Cavallo

MIT Course Number:

15.012

Level:

Graduate

Course Features

• Selected lecture notes
• Assignments (no solutions)

Course Description

15.012 Applied Macro- and International Economics uses case studies to investigate the macroeconomic environment in which firms operate. The first half of the course develops the basic tools of macroeconomic management: monetary, fiscal, and exchange rate policy. The class discusses recent emerging market and financial crises by examining their causes and considering how best to address them and prevent them from recurring in the future. The second half evaluates different strategies of economic development. Topics covered in the second half of this course include growth, the role of debt and foreign aid, and the reliance on natural resources.

Syllabus

Course Meeting Times

Lectures: 3 sessions / week, 1.5 hours / session for 6 weeks

Course Description

This course investigates the macroeconomic environment in which firms operate. It aims to provide a good grounding in macroeconomic concepts and tools, using specific country experiences. The course first develops the basic tools of macroeconomic management, predominantly monetary and fiscal policy.
First, we will use both historic case studies as well as discussions of modern policy for context. This is focused on the short run and will therefore also include a discussion of what exchange rate decisions economies make. We also discuss why crises occur and how to manage these crises (both currency and financial).
Second, we concentrate on the behavior of exchange rates. We study short run and long run theories of nominal exchange rates, as well as look at the different exchange rate regimes used in the world. We will study the advantages and disadvantages of flexible, fixed, and managed exchange rate systems. We study capital controls and other policies devoted to manage capital flows.
Third, we finish the course by introducing some of the long run issues in developing and emerging economies. We will spend some time discussing alternative strategies to growth and development that have been followed by various economies to understand their success (or lack thereof). Overall, the class will try to cover a broad array of emerging economies from China and India to Latina America, as well as a good discussion of the issues facing developed countries in the 21st century.

Related Courses

15.014 Macroeconomics, Development and Sustainability requires 15.012 as a prerequisite. 15.018 Global Economic Challenges also recommends 15.012 as a prerequisite.

Course Requirements

Before each class, you are expected to read at least the relevant case and usually an extra article and/or note. All required readings are cited in the readings section of the course. This list also includes optional readings. These optional readings are meant for those interested in further reading or for those who want a different reference for the tools and material covered in class. In that spirit, there are three optional text books which you can use if you want more detail on any of the theories covered in class:
[MFS] = Mankiw, N. Gregory, and Laurence Ball. Macroeconomics and the Financial System. Worth Publishers, 2010. ISBN: 9781429253673.
[M] = Mankiw, N. Gregory. Macroeconomics. 7th ed. Worth Publishers, 2009. ISBN: 9781429218870.
[KOM] = Krugman, Paul R., Maurice Obstfeld, and Marc Melitz. International Economics: Theory and Policy. Prentice Hall, 2011. ISBN: 9780132146654.
This is a case/readings based class. There is no final exam. Instead, there will be a short graded assignment, and two classes will be reserved for debates, which are detailed in the assignments section.

Grading

Grading criteria.

ACTIVITIES	POINTS
Short assignment	30 points
Class participation	30 points
Debate slides (10 points / presentation)	40 points
Debate victory	10 extra points per debate

Class Participation

Class participation is graded on a range of -2 to 3 in every class. If you do not attend class, you get a -2. If you attend but do not speak up much, you get 0. If you speak up with at least one decent comment, you will get points ranging from 1 to 3, depending on the quality of the comment. Speaking up on its own is not enough to earn even a 1. A 3 will be awarded extremely rarely and is for a comment/question that really changes the discussion. Your final participation grade is an average of all the individual class grades.

 

 

Calendar

Course calendar.

SES #	TOPICS	KEY DATES
1	Introduction and the money multiplier via babysitters
2	Germany and Zimbabwe: Monetary policy and the velocity theory of money
3	The IS-LM model
4	Japan, Ireland, and the Great Depression: Applications of the IS-LM model: Fiscal policy and the Great Depression
5	AD-AS and long run adjustment: The connection to inflation
6	Central bank accounting	Problem set 1 due
7	World through inflation
8	Banking crisis and accounting
9	Theories of nominal exchange rates: Short-run and long-run
10	Fiscal currency crises (GAME: Greece, Argentina, Mexico, and Everyone else)
11	Self-fulfilling currency crises (MIT: Malaysia, Indonesia, and Thailand)
12	Exchange-rate regimes
13	Capital controls, exchange rate regimes, and unemployment: The unholy trinity
14	US financial crisis	Debate slides due
15	Debate 1: The international role of the dollar	In-class debate
16	Debate 2: The Euro	In-class debate
17	Introduction to development economics

 

Readings

A series of case studies are required readings for the course. Additional case studies and textbook chapters are suggested as optional readings. The following texts are recommended:
[MFS] = Mankiw, N. Gregory, and Laurence Ball. Macroeconomics and the Financial System. Worth Publishers, 2010. ISBN: 9781429253673.
[M] = Mankiw, N. Gregory. Macroeconomics. 7th ed. Worth Publishers, 2009. ISBN: 9781429218870.
[KOM] = Krugman, Paul R., Maurice Obstfeld, and Marc Melitz. International Economics: Theory and Policy. Prentice Hall, 2011. ISBN: 9780132146654.

Course readings.

SES #	TOPICS	READINGS
1	Introduction and the money multiplier via babysitters	Optional "Money and Inflation." Chapter 4 in [M]. "Price Levels and the Exchange Rate in the Long Run." Chapter 15 in [KOM].
2	Germany and Zimbabwe: Monetary policy and the velocity theory of money	Required Moss, David A., and Julio J. Rotemberg. "German Hyperinflation of 1923." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-798-048, January 5, 1998. Optional Wells, Wyatt, and David A. Moss. "Note on Money and Monetary Policy." Harvard Business School Note. Harvard Business School Publishing. Note: 9-797-094, January 24, 1997. "Money and Inflation." Chapter 4 in [M]. "Price Levels and the Exchange Rate in the Long Run." Chapter 15 in [KOM].
3	The IS-LM model	Optional "Aggregate Demand I: Building the IS-LM Model." Chapter 10 in [M]. "Aggregate Demand II: Applying the IS-LM Model." Chapter 11 in [M].
4	Japan, Ireland, and the Great Depression: Applications of the IS-LM model: Fiscal policy and the Great Depression	Required McCraw, Thomas K. "Great Depression: Causes and Impact." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-391-258, July 3, 1991. Kanno, Akiko, and Laura Alfaro. "Kinyuseiksaku: Monetary Policy in Japan." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-708-017, January 8, 2008. Optional Kennedy, Robert E. "National Income Accounting." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-797-075, November 15, 1996. "National Income: Where It Comes From and Where It Goes." Chapter 3 in [M]. "Aggregate Demand I: Building the IS-LM Model." Chapter 10 in [M]. "Aggregate Demand II: Applying the IS-LM Model." Chapter 11 in [M]. "Output and the Exchange Rate in the Short Run." Chapter 16 in [KOM].
5	AD-AS and long run adjustment: The connection to inflation	Required Kennedy, Robert E. "Fiscal Policy: Managing Aggregate Demand." Harvard Business School Note. Harvard Business School Publishing. Note: 9-797-076, January 15, 1997. Revised March 30, 1998. Optional "Introduction to Economic Fluctuations." Chapter 9 in [M]. "Aggregate Demand I: Building the IS-LM Model." Chapter 10 in [M].
6	Central bank accounting	Optional "Money and Inflation." Chapter 4 in [M]. "Investment." Chapter 18 in [M].
7	World through inflation	Optional "The Data of Macroeconomics." Chapter 2 in [M]. "Money and Inflation." Chapter 4 in [M].
8	Banking crisis and accounting	Optional "Banking." Chapter 18 in [MFS].
9	Theories of nominal exchange rates: Short-run and long-run	Optional "Money, Interest Rates, and the Exchange Rates." Chapter 14 in [KOM]. "Price Levels and the Exchange Rate in the Long Run."Chapter 15 in [KOM]. "Output and the Exchange Rate in the Short Run." Chapter 16 in [KOM].
10	Fiscal currency crises (GAME: Greece, Argentina, Mexico, and Everyone else)	Required Di Tella, Rafael, and Eliseo Neuman. "Menem and the Populist Tradition in Argentina." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-700-061, March 21, 2000. Di Tella, Rafael, and Ingrid Vogel. "2001 Crisis in Argentina: An IMF-Sponsored Default? (A)." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-704-004, October 27, 2003. Optional "Financial Crises." Chapter 19 in [MFS]. "Developing Countries: Growth, Crisis, and Reform." Chapter 22 in [KOM].
11	Self-fulfilling currency crises (MIT: Malaysia, Indonesia, and Thailand)	Required Alfaro, Laura, Rafael Di Tella, and Renee Kim. "Chronology of the Asian Financial Crisis." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-708-001, February 8, 2008. Pill, Huw, Rafael Di Tella, and Jonathan Schlefer. "Financial Crisis in Asia: 1997-1998 (Abridged)." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-709-004, October 31, 2008. Optional Pill, Huw. "Responding to the 21st Century Financial Crisis." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-798-090, April 13, 1998. "Developing Countries: Growth, Crisis, and Reform." Chapter 22 in [KOM].
12	Exchange-rate regimes	Required Di Tella, Rafael, and Ingrid Vogel. "Exchange Rate Regimes." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-704-038, May 5, 2004. Optional "The Open-Economy Revisited: The Mundell-Fleming Model and the Exchange-Rate Regime." Chapter 12 in [M]. "The International Monetary System, 1870-1973." Chapter 18 in [KOM]. "Macroeconomic Policy and Coordination Under Floating Exchange Rates." Chapter 19 in [KOM].
13	Capital controls, exchange rate regimes, and unemployment: The unholy trinity	Required Abelal, Rawi, and Laura Alfaro. "Capital Controls." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-702-082, April 3, 2002. Optional "The Open-Economy Revisited: The Mundell-Fleming Model and the Exchange-Rate Regime." Chapter 12 in [M]. "Macroeconomic Policy and Coordination Under Floating Exchange Rates." Chapter 19 in [KOM].
14	US financial crisis	Required Alfaro, Laura, Rafael Di Tella, Ingrid Vogel, and Matthew Johnson. "U.S. Current Account Deficit." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-706-002, July 6, 2005. Alfaro, Laura, and Renee Kim. "The First Global Financial Crisis of the 21st Century." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-709-057, April 7, 2009. Optional "Banking." Chapter 18 in [MFS]. "Financial Crises." Chapter 19 in [MFS]. "The Global Capital Market: Performance and Policy Problems." Chapter 21 in [KOM].
15	Debate 1: The international role of the dollar
16	Debate 2: The Euro
17	Introduction to development economics	Required Kennedy, Robert E., and Katherine Marquis. "China: Facing the 21st Century." Harvard Business School Case. Harvard Business School Publishing. Case: 9-798-066, February 13, 1998.

 

Lecture Notes

Lecture notes files.

SES #	TOPICS	LECTURE NOTES
1	Introduction and the money multiplier via babysitters	(PDF)
2	Germany and Zimbabwe: Monetary policy and the velocity theory of money
3	The IS-LM model	(PDF)
4	Japan, Ireland, and the Great Depression: Applications of the IS-LM model: Fiscal policy and the Great Depression
5	AD-AS and long run adjustment: The connection to inflation	(PDF)
6	Central bank accounting	(PDF - 1.5MB)
7	World through inflation	(PDF)
8	Banking crisis and accounting
9	Theories of nominal exchange rates: Short-run and long-run	(PDF - 1.3MB)
10	Fiscal currency crises (GAME: Greece, Argentina, Mexico, and Everyone else)
11	Self-fulfilling currency crises (MIT: Malaysia, Indonesia, and Thailand)
12	Exchange-rate regimes	(PDF)
13	Capital controls, exchange rate regimes, and unemployment: The unholy trinity	(PDF)
14	US financial crisis
15	Debate 1: The international role of the dollar
16	Debate 2: The Euro
17	Introduction to development economics

 

Assignments

The short assignment is individual - it can be worked on in groups, but each person has to hand in an individual write up for individual grades.
Problem Set 1: The IS-LM Model (PDF)

Debates

Debate Questions

These are the two questions to be debated:
Ses #15: On January 16th 2011, days before an official visit to the US, China's President Hu Jintao made the following remarks to the press: "The monetary policy of the United States has a major impact on global liquidity and capital flows and therefore, the liquidity of the US dollar should be kept at a reasonable and stable level"
Should the US Federal Reserve worry about the effects of its monetary policy in other countries?
Should it care about the dollar's role in international markets?
Ses #16: Should Greece, Ireland, Spain, Portugal and similar countries abandon the Euro? Should there be two Euro zones, one for the periphery and one for the core countries (Germany, France, etc)?

Debate Instructions

Students will sort into teams of 3 or 4. Each team will have to prepare 4 presentations, 2 per debate, one for each position (i.e. "yes" and "no"). These should be PowerPoint presentations with a maximum length of 7 slides for each position. This is the only deliverable you have to do for the debates.
Before the debates, a secret ballot will be held for each of the debate questions. Every individual in the class must vote 'yes' or 'no' to each question.
On the day of the debate, we will randomly select two teams to present their slides and makes their cases. Whether they present in support of "yes" or "no" is also randomly assigned. A team can be selected to present in both debates.
After the debate, the students that did not present will vote again. We will exclude the votes from the presenters in the first survey and compare the change in the results between the pre-debate and post-debate surveys. The team that shifted public opinion in their favor will win the debate. If you win, you get 10 additional points for each individual in the team.

Debate Structure

• The team pro the debate (yes) starts with 5 minutes.
• The team against the debate (no) goes next with 7 minutes.
• The team pro the date (yes) has 2 minutes for rebuttal.
• The debate is then opened to the class on both sides of the debate for additional arguments and discussions for 15 minutes. Finally, the professors will summarize.

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