General
Welcome to SGT online lecture series of State of the World and Development 2020!
Note that course is online. Lectures include discussion and dialogue. Sessions are not recorded.
This lecture series gives an introduction to the state of the world and development. It highlights the environmental, social and economic aspects of sustainable development and explores the dilemma of development from different perspectives. Lecture series is open for all. For those aiming to gain 2 credits; register in weboodi. 80% attendance & assignment completion required to pass the course. See course Syllabus for further information.
- Mondays & Wednesdays 10:00 - 11:30 (5 weeks)
- Period: I *First lecture on Monday 14 September 2020 at 10:00
- 2 ECTS (pass/fail)
- 10 guest lectures & reflection assignment
- Course coordinator: Julia Renko (julia.renko@aalto.fi)
LECTURES 2020
Note students: Zoom-link to all the sessions will be found after this section
WEEK 1
Monday 14 Sep | 10-12
Lecture 1 - "Dilemma of Development"
Wednesday 16 Sep | 10-12
Lecture 2 - "Aalto Lab Mexico - A Longitudinal Collaboration Process"
WEEK 2
Monday 21 Sep | 10-12
Lecture 3 - "Climate Change & Adaptation"
Wednesday 23 Sep | 10-12
Lecture 4 - "How Public Demand for Clean Air is Reshaping Energy and Emissions Trends"
Lauri Myllyvirta, Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air
Myllyvirta has worked for the past seven years as an energy and air pollution analyst covering air pollution issues across Asia. His research covers sources, drivers and health impacts of air pollution. Myllyvirta has published studies on the health impacts of coal-fired power generation in Southeast, South and East Asia, Europe, Turkey and South Africa. He has also done research on China's coal consumption and CO2 trends and the overcapacity situation in coal-fired power and steel industry. Myllyvirta has degrees in economics from Helsinki University and in environmental science from University of Jyväskylä.
Recommended pre-reading:
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Koplitz, Jacob, Myllyvirta and Sulprizio 2017: Burden of Disease from Rising Coal-Fired Power Plant Emissions in Southeast Asia. Environmental Science & Technology. http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.est.6b03731
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Defeating the Airpocalypse: 13 solutions for clean air assessed. Greenpeace India. http://www.greenpeace.org/archive-india/Global/india/2018/Indias_Source_Apportionment_Results_Briefing_May2018.pdf
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Myllyvirta, L. (2020). Analysis: China’s CO2 emissions surged past pre-coronavirus levels in May. CarbonBrief - clear on climate. https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-chinas-co2-emissions-surged-past-pre-coronavirus-levels-in-may?utm_content=bufferd871f&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
WEEK 3
Monday 28 Sep | 10-12
Lecture 5 - "Development Policy and Global Goals"
Suvi Virkkunen, Senior Advisor, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Suvi Virkkunen works as Team leader for Quality and Results at the Department for Development Policy at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland. She has more than 20 years work experience in development policy and cooperation both with civil society organisations at national, EU and global level as well as with the EU and the Government of Finland. Within the MFA she has been the pen-holder in the preparations of all key policy documents for Finland’s development policy during the last 7 years. She has been involved with the negotiations of the Agenda 2030 in the UN as well as the national policy guiding and national methodology monitoring Finland’s implementation. Ms. Virkkunen holds a Masters degree from the University of Tampere, majoring in international politics. Her thesis studied how poverty eradication steered the development policy of the European Union.
The Sustainable Development Agenda
United Nations: The Sustainable Development Goals Report 2020
Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Development policy and development cooperation
Wednesday 30 Sep | 10-12
Lecture 6 - “The Role of Innovation, Technology, and Entrepreneurship in Developing Asia. CASE: Vietnam’s Emerging Technology Industry”
WEEK 4
Monday 5 Oct | 10-12
Lecture 7 - “The implications of COVID-19 for growth and employment in developing countries”
Kunal Sen is Director of UNU-WIDER and Professor of Development Economics in the Global Development Institute at The University of Manchester. Previously he has been Joint Research Director for the Effective States and Inclusive Development Research Centre. In addition, Professor Sen has substantial experience serving in advisory roles with national governments and bilateral and multilateral development agencies including the UK Department for International Development (DFID), Asian Development Bank (ADB), and International Development Research Centre (IDRC). He has worked extensively in South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa and South-east Asia.
Professor Sen holds a PhD degree in Economics from Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. He has published extensively in peer-reviewed journals and is the co-editor of Deals and Development: The Political Dynamics of Growth Episodes (2018; co-author of The Political Economy of India’s Growth Episodes (2016) and Out of the Shadows: The Informal Sector in Post-Reform India (2016); and author of Trade Policy, Inequality and Performance in Indian Manufacturing (2008). He has been awarded the Sanjaya Lall Memorial Prize and the Dudley Seers Memorial Prize for the excellence of his research. Professor Sen’s research is in the interface of international development and political economy. His principal areas of research have been on inclusive growth, political economy, and the analysis of poverty and social exclusion in developing countries. His research in each of these areas has been internationally recognized and has had a strong impact on both academic research and on policy.
Recommended pre-readings:
- UNU-WIDER Blog: Five ways coronavirus is deepening global inequality
- Danquah, M., Schotte, S. and Sen, K. (2020). Covid-19 and employment: Insights from the Sub-Saharan African Experience. Wider background note 7/2020. UNU-WIDER, Helsinki, Finland. https://www.wider.unu.edu/sites/default/files/Publications/Background-note/PDF/bn2020-7-covid-19-employment-subSaharan-Africa.pdf
- Addison, T., Sen, K. & Tarp, F. (2020) COVID-19: macroeconomic dimensions in the developing world. WIDER Working Paper 2020/74. Helsinki: UNU-WIDER. https://www.wider.unu.edu/sites/default/files/Publications/Working-paper/PDF/wp2020-74.pdf
Lecture 8 - "Global Food Challenges and Opportunities"
Matti Kummu, Associate Professor, Aalto ENG, Water and Development Research Group
The main focus of Prof. Kummu's research is the interaction between human population and water resources. He has been working extensively on assessing the global water scarcity and how it has impacted on food production and availability. To ease the ever-growing pressure on water and land resources, his team, Water and Development Research Group, is working actively in quantifying the potential of different measures, such as diet change, food loss reduction, emerging non-meat protein sources, and yield gap closure, to sustainably increase the food availability globally. Finally, his team also focuses on a more local scale challenges and opportunities on water-energy-food nexus, particularly in Southeast Asian context.
WEEK 5
Monday 12 Oct | 10-12
Lecture 9 - “Decolonizing Development: Africentric Perspective”
Wednesday 14 Oct | 10-12
Lecture 10 - "Urban Inequalities in the Global South - Latin America and Covid-19: Challenges and Responses in Urban Settings"
- Covid-19 in Latin America: From health to hunger crisis?
- Special programme: The Covid-19 challenge in Latin America
- Note:
- The same link will be used for all lectures.
- The host will admit you from the waiting room until 10:20. After that new participants are not admitted. Note that course has attendance requirement.