The Economics of International Business
Jordan I. Siegel
HBS 4720
The goal of this seminar is to introduce doctoral students to the field of international business. While economics forms the disciplinary foundation of the course, we will also compare and contrast other approaches from sociology, political science, and social psychology. At the end of this course, students should have developed the ability to evaluate various empirical approaches in the field. Finally, students should also end the course with a well-defined research proposal. This proposal will include a theoretical question, a literature review, an evaluation of the available data sources, and a plan for gathering any additional data necessary to answer the theoretical question.
We begin the course by reviewing the key theoretical ideas that launched the field of international business. The rest of the course, addressing both theoretical and empirical issues, will examine cross-country issues including the literatures on multinationals, economic geography, and FDI. The course also examines within-country issues including comparative institutional analysis and the origin and persistence of differences in the business environments across countries. The course thus develops a perspective on the extent to which firm choices and managerial behavior are universal as opposed to context-dependent.
Prerequisite: Economics 2010a or the equivalent.
