Social rights, financialization and inequalities

Recommended Prerequisites

Basic skills in the field of social sciences are recommended. Considering that the seminars are lectured in English, it is a fundamental prerequisite that students have a knowledge of the English language that allows them an adequate comprehension and oral expression, as well as reading and interpreting academic texts. With regards to writing, students must have the appropriate skills to write in English, or Portuguese or Spanish.

Teaching Methods

This curricular unit's classes will switch between moments of oral presentation by professors and students (presentation of texts or topics related to the programme) and moments of collective reflection and debate. The latter will include active teaching activities, such as group works and simulations. For the model to fully work, students have to read recommended reading before each class.

Learning Outcomes

General objective:

understand the relationship between law and social and economic (in)equality.

Specific objectives:

1. reflect on the new functions of law; its role in austerity societies and in the exception marked by the extension of financialization processes to different social spheres;

2. critically reflect on the role of law in the production and reproduction of social inequalities, starting from a non-neutral conception of the formulas of legal regulation;

3. critically reflect on the results and effects of socio-legal regulation within the framework of redistributive mechanisms of social justice.

Work Placement(s)

No

Syllabus

1. Law and social inequalities

2. The role of law and its functions within the framework of financial capitalism

3. The erosion of fundamental rights within the framework of the conflicts on mobilisation and interpretation of law

4. Instrumentalisation of social rights in the context of post-democratic societies and illiberal democracy

5. Questioning the theory of powers' separation by the power of non-elected in the framework of the processes of production and application of social rights

6. State financialisation and its impact on public policies

7. Austerity and exception as socio-legal categories, in the framework of the neoliberal narratives.

Head Lecturer(s)

João Pedro Amaral Cabouco Rodrigues

Assessment Methods

Assessment
Assessment will be dynamic and bipartite: written work in English or Portuguese or Spanish (70%) and oral participation in class (30%): 100.0%

Bibliography

Streeck, Wolfgang, Schäfer, Armin (eds) (2013), Politics in the Age of Austerity. Cambridge: John Wiley & Sons.

Ferreira, António Casimiro (2016), “The Politics of Austerity as Politics of Law”, Oñati Socio-Legal Series, Past, Present and Future of Sociology of Law, 6 (3), 496-519.

Guibentif, Pierre (2014), "Law in the semi-periphery: revisiting an ambitious theory in the light of recent Portuguese socio-legal research". International Journal of Law in Context, 10 (4): 538-558.

Rodrigues, J.; Santos, A. C.; Teles, N. (2016). Semi-peripheral financialisation: the case of Portugal. Review of International Political Economy, 23(3), 480-510.

 van der Zwan, N. (2014). State of the art – Making sense of financialization. Socio-Economic Review, 12, 99-129.