The primary course goal is for students to master the logic, intuition and operation of a financial system - money, financial markets (money and capital markets, debt and equity markets, derivatives markets), and financial institutions and intermediaries (the Central Bank, depository institutions, credit unions, pension funds, insurance companies, venture capital firms, investment banks, mutual funds, etc.). In other words, how money/capital change hands between agents over time, directly and through institutions. Material will be both quantitative and qualitative, yet always highly analytical with a focus on active learning - there will be an approximately equal emphasis on solving mathematical finance problems (e.g. bond or option pricing) and on policy analysis (e.g. monetary policy and financial regulation.) Students will not be rewarded for memorizing and regurgitating facts, but rather for demonstrating the ability to reason with difficult problems and situations with which they might not previously be familiar.

Summer session students wishing to enroll who feel they have the appropriate prerequisites from another institution may submit that information, transcript or syllabus that is similar to Econ 52, to econ-undergrad@stanford.edu.

The course's objective is to build the analytical foundation for understanding key macro issues in the world economy such as global capital flows, the behavior of exchange rates, currency and sovereign debt crises. While a significant portion of the course will be theoretical, there will be several occasions for linking the theory to real-world events.

Summer session students wishing to enroll who feel they have the appropriate prerequisites from another institution may submit that information, transcript or syllabus that is similar to Econ 52, to econ-undergrad@stanford.edu.

The purpose of the class is for you to obtain greater comfort making the major financial decisions your life journey will require. Illustrative examples, case studies, historical and statistical evidence, and some simple analytical tools will be presented. Small breakout sessions with other students will focus on applying the material to developing and analyzing the options available to you and the tradeoffs among them in the situations you will face, from job choice to home purchase to investing. We hope to help students avoid damaging mistakes in the decisions that will determine their financial flexibility and safeguard them against life's uncertainties. Students will learn how to keep more options open and to live with fewer constraints by making sound financial decisions. Topics include making a financial plan and budget, managing money, obtaining and using credit and loans, saving, investing in stocks, bonds, mutual funds, ETFs, options and other assets, venture capital and private equity, purchasing insurance, purchasing vs. renting a home, getting a mortgage, taxes, inflation and inflation protection, financial markets and financial advisors.

Summer 2024: Students will be given the option to take the full 5-unit course (Section 01) or a revised 1-unit course option that will be offered CR/NC ONLY. The 1-unit course option is suggested for students who are interested in learning more about the personal finance topics taught in this course but who may not already have background knowledge in economics. Those interested in the 1-unit course offering should enroll in section 02. The one unit course option cannot be applied to economics degree requirements.

The purpose of the class is for you to obtain greater comfort making the major financial decisions your life journey will require. Illustrative examples, case studies, historical and statistical evidence, and some simple analytical tools will be presented. Small breakout sessions with other students will focus on applying the material to developing and analyzing the options available to you and the tradeoffs among them in the situations you will face, from job choice to home purchase to investing. We hope to help students avoid damaging mistakes in the decisions that will determine their financial flexibility and safeguard them against life's uncertainties. Students will learn how to keep more options open and to live with fewer constraints by making sound financial decisions. Topics include making a financial plan and budget, managing money, obtaining and using credit and loans, saving, investing in stocks, bonds, mutual funds, ETFs, options and other assets, venture capital and private equity, purchasing insurance, purchasing vs. renting a home, getting a mortgage, taxes, inflation and inflation protection, financial markets and financial advisors.

Summer 2024: Students will be given the option to take the full 5-unit course (Section 01) or a revised 1-unit course option that will be offered CR/NC ONLY. The 1-unit course option is suggested for students who are interested in learning more about the personal finance topics taught in this course but who may not already have background knowledge in economics. Those interested in the 1-unit course offering should enroll in section 02. The one unit course option cannot be applied to economics degree requirements.

This course explores the ways we talk and think about how systems work, using nonfiction and science fiction to understand software, hardware, and wetware. A theoretical grounding in the tools used to analyze such systems from a humanistic perspective, including tools from cyber/data feminism, anti-orientalism, and queer theory, as well as practical experience in systems analysis. Students will produce soft/hard/wetware criticism of their own in addition to literary-critical argument. No coding experience required.

How can a feminist lens help us understand technology? What can technology teach us about gender? This course explores the mutual shaping of gender and technology using an intersectional feminist approach. We will draw on theories from feminist science and technology studies (STS) to examine contemporary and historical case studies with attention to how race, sexuality, disability, and class impact the relationship between gender and technology. Topics include the history of computing, digital labor and the gig economy, big data and surveillance, bias and algorithms, reproductive technologies, videogames, and social media.

War has fundamentally shaped the ways that Americans think about themselves, their fellow Americans, and the meanings of national citizenship. Whatever the extent of American participation, war has transformed how Americans think about other nations, the environment, technology, and the meaning of death and dying. War has also posed challenges of representation, both for those who fought as well as those who did not. Wars and revolutions abroad have likewise played a part in molding American identity. This course examines how Americans have observed, experienced, and thought about modern war and revolution in history, literature, and popular culture. Course themes will include mobilization, protest and dissent, building empire, gender and masculinity, race and xenophobia, the economics of war, coercion and propaganda, war and the environment, and the changing meanings of death and sacrifice. The course begins with the American Civil War, and takes students through the rise of American empire, the world wars, the Bolshevik Revolution, the Cold War, Vietnam, and closes with the War on Terror. Students will be introduced to a variety of primary and secondary sources and historical methods directed at probing the paradox of how conflict creates social cohesion, and will be guided by a basic ethical question: how do we live together?

As the PRC’s economic and political clout has grown, Chinese diplomacy and foreign relations have drawn far more attention. Especially following the start of Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road initiative, both popular and academic commentators have often referred to the supposedly ancient precedents of the modern PRC’s approach to foreign policy. PRC leaders have themselves invoked the Chinese tradition of foreign relations as one that enabled largely peaceful coexistence between China and its neighbors, unlike Western alternatives. This course will take a long-durée approach to understanding the conceptual frameworks, interactions, and historical events that shaped Chinese diplomacy and foreign relations from the time of the Mongol invasions up to the early twentieth century. The questions we will consider include: What basic geographic, environmental, and economic factors influenced Chinese foreign relations? Did frequently invoked concepts like “the tributary system” or “Silk Road” actually exist in Chinese thought, and if so, how did they affect the pragmatic practice of diplomacy? What was the role of ritual, poetry, and other forms of praxis in the sphere of foreign relations? How did the way that Chinese thought about the outside world and foreigners thought about China shift over time, especially in the 19th century with the advent of the much more pressing threat of European powers and Japan? The course will conclude by more directly examining the legacy of imperial Chinese foreign relations for China and the world in the 20th and 21st century.

The course seeks to explain the history of international relations in the tumultuous century since 1914. It aims at a three-dimensional understanding, relating social and political structures of countries and regions to the primary shifts in the character of the competition between states, in the composition of the system, and in international institutions and norms. Great power interactions constitute the most visible element within the course: through the two world wars, into the Cold War, and beyond. Concurrently, we look within the empires and blocs of the Twentieth Century world, to consider the changing relationships between imperial centers and subject peoples. Lastly, we consider spirited if sporadic international efforts to pursue order, justice, and progress. This last pursuit also requires study of the proliferation of transnational non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

The course, traces the history of genocide in the 20th century and the question of humanitarian intervention to stop it, a topic that has been especially controversial since the end of the Cold War. The pre-1990s discussion begins with the Armenian genocide during the First World War and includes the Holocaust and Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge in the 1970s. Coverage of genocide and humanitarian intervention since the 1990s includes the wars in Bosnia, Rwanda, Kosovo, the Congo, and Sudan. The final session of the course will be devoted to a discussion of the International Criminal Court and the separate criminal tribunals that have been tasked with investigating and punishing the perpetrators of genocide.