Corsi di Studio del Dipartimento di Culture, Politica e Società

The course aims at enabling students to understand the structure and purposes of the main international organizations and of the other actors in the field of international economic law. In particular, it aims at providing the analytical tools for a basic understanding of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, their institutional and legal framework and their interconnections. The course will also focus on sovereign debt issues.

Students will be provided both with a solid background as well as a set of conceptual and critical tools for reflecting more deeply on the role of international financial institutions in the world economic order and the logics of sovereign debt.

This course contributes to the realization of the AGIC curriculum by introducing the functioning of key international financial institutions (the World Bank, the IMF) and by explaining how sovereign debt impacts on development. The standpoint adopted is that of public international law.

The course will be taught through the traditional learning model based on frontal lectures as well as through interactive lectures and group work actvities. Reference documents will be distributed to stimulate debate. Experts in specific fields may be invited as speakers.

Teaching and reading materials will be made available through the Moodle platform. The platform will also be used to organise group activities.

It is therefore essential and compulsory that all the students enrol on the Moodle page of the course to have full access to studying materials and for communication purposes.

The first lecture will take place on the 25th of September 2023 at 18:00 (Rome time) in class.

Lectures will be held on Monday Tuesday Wednesday h. 18-20 at the Campus Luigi Einaudi.

EXAM MODALITIES for A.Y. 2023-2024

For students regularly attending class in a.y. 2023-2024

Evaluation: 

• 1) Group work participation (a breakout group exercise that will be organized during the course) = 25%
• 2) A test – with multiple choice and true/false questions – on what was discussed in class and on the studying materials uploaded on Moodle. This test can be taken only at the exam session of mid-December 2023 or at the first exam session of January 2024 (the exact dates will be communicated in class and through Moodle) = 75%

After the first exam session of January 2024 all the students will be considered non-attending (see below) and therefore the group work will not anymore be considered for the final grade.

PLUS

• A. Viterbo, Sovereign Debt Restructuring: The Role and Limits of Public International Law, Giappichelli, 2020, Chapters 1,2,3 (pp. 1-117), available also as e-book.

*****

Expected learning outcomes (according to Dublin descriptors)

Knowledge and understanding: knowledge of the main topics analyzed during the course

Applying knowledge and understanding: ability to apply the knowledge acquired to understand relevant reading materials and news, to participate in a discussion or a conference, to understand experts

Making judgements: ability to recognize relevant research materials, to identify a research question, to structure the content of an essay, to interpret sources and to provide an answer to the research question 

Communication: ability to communicate the acquired knowledge, demonstrating an adequate capacity of synthesis and abstraction and using a clear and rigorous language (grammar included)

Lifelong learning skills: acquisition of an effective study method, ability to identify and interpret different problems and texts.