M2 PPD: Economics of Regulation in Developing Countries

The class participation mark will be based on all of your speaking within the classroom, excluding the presentation. Class participation therefore includes your contribution to structured activities within the classes (e.g. debates and other exercises based on homework) as well as more spontaneous contributions such as comments or questions made in response to my slides. Note that I reward this behaviour mainly as a way to incentivize a more active classroom - I'm therefore more concerned with you saying something, and less concerned with you saying something "interesting" or "right"! Indeed, questions along the lines of "I don't understand the point you just said, can you explain it a different way?" can contribute to this mark, since you are likely providing a public good by speaking up for your fellow classmates who also don't understand.

Presentation

Each week there will be a student presentation - please sign up on the doodle for which paper you would like to present. There are often two students per presentation, but please make sure all slots are filled before ‘doubling up’. Presentations should be 15 minutes overall, including 10 minutes presenting the paper and 5 minutes going beyond the paper – e.g. critiques, policy implications, reflections. Note that I won’t count time answering questions from audience, so please don't hesitate to ask people presenting questions!

Presenting a paper in 10 minutes is hard – be ruthless in what you present:

Focus on the key message of the paper
For every detail you are thinking of putting on a slide, ask yourself “Do others need to know this to understand the key message?”
Try to focus on main result / table / graph – no problem not to include supplementary results and robustness checks

What I’m looking for in “going beyond the paper”:

Did you find something missing from the paper? Was something unconvincing?
Does the paper have interesting implications for policy or other research?
What questions does the paper prompt you to ask?

For each of these, you get more points if you are not copying what’s suggested in the paper!

Essay

The course is partly evaluated based on an essay. This essay is 2000-3000 words on a regulation in a developing country of your choice. Both regulation and developing country can be interpreted broadly, but bear in mind you should be able to demonstrate understanding of the economic issues involved and discussed in the lectures. The essay should address one or more of the following points:

Why is/was the regulation there?
What would be an alternative?
How would this alternative compare?
How is the regulation adapted (or not) to the country context?
What are the impacts of the regulation?
What would be an interesting research question on the regulation?

The essay should be framed around a question and the answer shouldn't be obvious. I am looking for essays to be clearly structured and well written - e.g. there should be an introduction that sets out the question and lays out how you are going to try to answer it. For advice on writing essays, please check out this link.

Please cover an original and interesting example (i.e. not the same as your classmates, or something we have discussed in depth in lectures). Thinking about what you find interesting is the best place to start – then work out what about it that’s interesting so that you can convince me!

Statements should be backed up with evidence, but not necessarily academic papers. I am looking for a demonstration of your understanding of some of the ideas discussed in the lectures, i.e.

- Are there concepts that you have encountered in the lectures which you can apply to your case?
- Is there a parallel between your case and something we have covered in class?
- Does your case seem to have different implications from what we have discussed in class?
- Would the ideas considered in the class suggest the regulation should be designed differently?

The essay is due by 31st January 2024.

Here are some examples of good essays from previous years. Please note that none of them are perfect and you are free to experiment with topics / styles which are very different:

- Digging through the limitations of the Kimberley Process
- Labour regulation in Bangladesh under the NTPA

Please note that some of these date from years when there was a longer word limit. Also note that not all of these set up the essay with a question, but I still think this is probably the best thing to do!