Title: Planting the seed of change: a student-led introduction course to economics

Authors: Timothée Parrique

Addresses: Centre for Environment and Development Studies (CEMUS), Uppsala University and Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Villavägen 16, 752 36 Uppsala, Sweden

Abstract: This article describes an introduction course to issues of political economy in the context of the Anthropocene. The Global Economy: Environment, Development, and Globalisation is a 15-credit course that has been offered since 2003 at the student-run University Centre for Environment and Development Studies (Cemus) at Uppsala University in Sweden. This paper presents the courses content and form as designed and taught by the author during the fall of 2012, 2013, and 2014. I argue that (a) such a course can complement traditional economics education in a way that would promote pluralism; and (b) that student-led education initiatives like Cemus have the potential to make curricula more evolutionary in the long term, for the benefit of students, teachers, and society as a whole.

Keywords: economics education; curriculum reform; student-led education; political economy; pedagogical pluralism; pedagogy; heterodox; teaching; sustainability; interdisciplinarity; introductory economics; Sweden; interdisciplinary courses.

DOI: 10.1504/IJPEE.2015.074353

International Journal of Pluralism and Economics Education, 2015 Vol.6 No.3, pp.219 - 236

Received: 09 Jul 2015
Accepted: 27 Sep 2015
Published online: 24 Jan 2016 *

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