Feminist Ecological Economics and Sustainability

Synopsis New developments in feminist ecological economics and ecofeminist economics are contributing to the search for theories and policy approaches to move economies toward sustainability. This paper summarizes work by ecofeminists and feminist ecological economists which is relevant to the sustainability challenge and its implications for the discipline of economics. Both democracy and lower material throughputs are generally seen as basic principles of economic sustainability. Feminist theorists and feminist ecological economists offer many important insights into the conundrum of how to make a democratic and equity-enhancing transition to an economy based on less material throughput. These flow from feminist research on unpaid work and caring labor, provisioning, development, valuation, social reproduction, non-monetized exchange relationships, local economies, redistribution, citizenship, equity-enhancing political institutions, and labor time, as well as creative modeling approaches and activism-based theorizing.      

Teaching Principles Of Economics Without Lectures

Lectures have generally been considered essential to good instruction. Indeed, some colleges have severely penalized truant students who dared absent themselves from the lecture hall. In this article, McConnell and Lamphear present important evidence that “students taking principles of economics with lectures, and those taking the course on a lectureless basis [perform] equally well on an intensive battery of objective examinations.”     

The Principles of Economics Course: A Historical Perspective

The author's research provides an amusing and thoughtful account of what has happened to the teaching of the beginning course in economics over the past century and should cause the profession to reflect upon what is known for sure about the relative effectiveness of various methods of presenting the subject to students. As one example, what is the role of close personal contact between teacher and student (as indicated by class size) in providing a favorable environment for learning the art and/or the science of economics?     

西方经济学教学过程中存在的主要问题及其化解对策探讨

目前在西方经济学的教学过程中主要存在着价值观引导、经济学分析方法的认识深化、理论与实际脱节以及课程体系调整没到位等方面的问题。为解决这些问题,一方面应充分认识到西方经济学的理论研究与教学间所存在的巨大差距,切实明确课堂教学的价值观目标;同时注重对西方经济学产生过程的历程以及不同经济学家思想观点的比较分析,避免将西方经济学的教学过程变成单纯的理论与观点灌输;另一方面则要加强教材研究和教材建设中的伦理道德导向内容．切实保持相关课程间在内容以及伦理道德观上的连续性与一致性。     

Programmed Learning-Policy Analysis: An Experiment in Teaching Principles of Economics

Darnton reports on an experiment using programmed instruction in macroeconomics. He also explains how assignments to write “position papers” on economic policies are used. An analysis of the experiment deals with the time devoted to the course by students and instructor, student understanding of economics and student attitude toward this approach. The TUCE was used as the testing instrument, and Darnton asserts that the experimental group did better than the control group on complex application questions. The experimental approach proved to be popular with the students, and the author claims that it provided for a more efficient use of faculty resources.     

Values and the Economics Principles Courses

Every economics teacher has probably wrestled with the problem of how to deal with values, and because of recent student demands for relevance this problem has become more troublesome. Professor Horton believes that economists should teach “only what we believe has been scientifically established” and “should not promote particular values or particular social decisions….” He asserts that values and goals should be considered in economic classes, however, and in this article he suggests a procedure for teaching a unit on values and goals.     

参与式教学法在食品工程原理课程教学中的应用

参与式教学法的核心是学生参与教学。通过学生参与食品工程原理课程教学活动,调动了学生学习兴趣,提高了学生学习主动性,培养了学生的创新能力。     

The Relative Effectiveness of Three Methods of Teaching Principles of Economics

Research on the impact of learning style preferences is very rare in economic education. This article reports the results of a project in which the student's preferred learning style and the instructor's teaching style were included as variables in a regression model. Those favoring independent styles achieved significantly more than students favoring dependent styles. Changes in student attitudes towards economics were also taken into account. The researchers assert that the addition of these variables also “greatly increases the power of the model to explain variation in student achievement and attitudes concerning economics.”     

The Effect of Macro/Micro Course Sequencing on Learning and Attitudes in Principles of Economics

Most of us naturally assume that the more courses a student takes the more he or she will learn. Little has been done, however, to determine just how much additional knowledge or understanding is acquired from economics courses above the introductory level. David Hartman, Director of Undergraduate Economics at Harvard, has taken an important step in attempting to measure the impact of the higher level courses. This atticle reports the results of a study of the effects of intermediate micro and macro courses, field courses, a “graduate-type highly theoretical course,” and a policy-oriented micro course. The report should be of great interest, and will probably engender additional research in other colleges.     

Principles of Neo-Schumpeterian Economics

Within the last 25 years great progress has been made in Neo-SchumpeterianEconomics, this branch of economic literature which deals withdynamic processes causing qualitative transformation of economiesbasically driven by the introduction of novelties in their variousand multifaceted forms. By its very nature, innovation and,in particular, technological innovation is the most exponentand most visible form of novelty. However, Neo-SchumpeterianEconomics should be concerned with all facets of open and uncertaindevelopments in socio-economic systems. A comprehensive Neo-Schumpeterianapproach therefore has to consider not only transformation processesgoing on, e.g., on the industry level of an economy, but alsoon the public and monetary side of an economic system. Our contributionintroduces those extensions and complements to a comprehensiveNeo-Schumpeterian economic theory, and develops some signpostsin the sense of a roadmap for necessary strands of analysisin the future.     

Observations on the Use of Textbooks in the Teaching of Principles of Economics: A Comment

The usual substitution effect of a price change between goods is extended to substitution among differentiated products within a heterogeneous good in a manner useful for the introductory and intermediate courses. The example of student choice of course load is used.     

Samuelson's Principles of Economics in 1948 and 1973

This article differs from those usually found in this journal, but it was felt that it would be of interest to most college teachers of economics. Professor Brazelton has systematically compared early and recent editions of Paul Samuelson's famous textbook, noting how Samuelson has substantially changed over a period of 25 years. Because Samuelson's text has had a profound influence on the content and approach to the introductory course, the changes that have occurred in that book should be noted by everyone responsible for teaching principles of economics.