FINAL EXAMINATION
Y376 International Political Economy
May 3, 2011
Part I. Multiple Choice (30 minutes)
Circle the letter (a, b, c, or d) with the best answer on your examination sheets.
Then mark the corresponding letter on the SCANTRON computer sheet.
1)Thomas Friedman uses the phrase ______to stand for a firm’s contracting with other firms (domestic or foreign) to conduct certain activities which had previously been done inside the firm.
a)outsourcing
b)in-forming
c)off shoring
d)viral marketing
2)Tom Friedman argues that one of the United States’ major problems is ______.
a)the failure to produce enough good pop music
b)shortages of scientists and engineers
c)the consumption of fast food
d)too much investment in R&D
3) What two countries are most responsible for the growth in global demand for oil in recent years?
a)Israel and Syria
b)Japan and the United States
c)Russia and Poland
d)China and India
4)Who is most likely to be hurt by the tendency of U.S. firms to locate low value-added manufacturing activities (like assembly of clothing items) offshore?
a)U.S. consumers
b)low-skilled U.S. workers
c)high-skilled U.S. workers
d)U.S. multinational corporations
5)Which of the following is not a source of clean electrons (according to Thomas Friedman)?
a)wind
b)geothermal
c)coal
d)solar
6)The tendency of political units to reduce regulations, minimum wages, taxes, and environmental standards in order to attract inflows of foreign direct investment is called a ______.
a)race to the bottom
b)dual-track approach
c)currency crisis
d)reinvention of government
7)According to Thomas Friedman, China and India are racing the rest of the world to ______.
a) the bottom
b) New Jersey
c) the top
d)global climate change
8)Comparing China to Russia, China achieved higher rates of growth by adopting ______policies.
a)export-led developmental state
b)import substituting industrialization
c)anti-globalization
d)outward foreign investment
9)Organized labor in the United Statestends to oppose globalization because______.
a)globalization results in higher wages
b)increased exports reduce employment levels
c)they support the views of US multinational managers
d)new jobs are often in areas that are not unionized
10) According to anti-globalization advocates, factory farms are more likely than small farms to ______.
a)reduce biodiversity
b)avoid genetically modified organisms
c)produce inexpensive food for poor people
d)engage in humane animal husbandry practices
11) If I bought some “Round-Up-Ready” soybeans, I would be able to ______.
a)grow bigger soybeans
b)get seeds from the resulting plants
c)use a herbicide called Round Up without fear of losing many soybean plants
d)reduce the water needed to grow plants
12) Which of the following firms is not one of the big three credit rating agencies?
a)Fitch Group
b)AIG
c)Moody’s
d)Standard and Poor’s
13)Who gets most of the blame for failing to regulate the derivatives markets?
a)Tim Geithner
b)Alan Greenspan
c)Larry Summers
d)Ronald Reagan
14) The tendency of multinational corporations to distribute their activities geographically (across more than one country) various aspects of producing goods and services in order to take advantage of lower costs is called the building of global ______.
a)value
b)distribution networks
c)production networks
d)brands
15) ______is a small country that recently witnessed bank failures that resulted in the necessity to adopt major austerity measures.
a)Netherlands
b)Denmark
c)Austria
d)Iceland
16) ______has increased its trade surplus with the United States to such an extent that its surplus is now much larger thanJapan's.
a)Russia
b)China
c)Germany
d)Canada
17)A city in India that is the home of several important business process outsourcing firms is ______.
a)Bangalore
b)Delhi
c)Bombay
d)Calcutta
18) What is the home country for Infosys and Wipro, two large business process outsourcing firms?
a)India
b)China
c)The United States
d)Japan
19)The most important underlying cause of economic globalization is ______.
a)agreement among the developing nations that globalization is good
b)reductions in global transaction and transportation costs
c)the persistence of communism in China
d)the welfare reforms of the 1990s
20). Which of the following environmental NGOs is the most radical?
a)Sierra Club
b)Friends of the Earth
c)The National Audubon Society
d)Greenpeace
21)The so-called “Washington Consensus” is consistent with which ideological tendency below?
a)Fascism
b)Post-Modernism
c)Communism
d)Neo-liberalism
22)Supporters of Slow Food advocate alliances between consumers, local restaurants, and _____ to promote better and more nutritional food.
a)chemical companies
b)sweatshops
c)local farmers
d)college professors
23) When you go to the web sites of multinational corporations these days, you will generally find something about ______.
a)Bono
b)corporate social responsibility
c)how awful globalization is
d)the evils of branding
24) An American theme park that now has branches in Europe and Asia is _____.
a)Dollywood
b)Six Flags
c)Disneyworld
d)Knott’s Berry Farm
25) ______is an example of a multinational corporation that benefits from stricter enforcement of intellectual property laws for pharmaceuticals.
a)Disney
b)Lilly
c)Microsoft
d)AIG
26)_____ is the Hindu goddess of destruction.
a)Shiva
b)Bollywood
c)Kali
d)Holi
27) The increasing tendency of global corporations to use advertising to create a mood about their company, rather than to describe specific products and services, is part of what Naomi Klein calls ______.
a)branding
b)globalization
c)cocooning
d)viral marketing
28) A Latin American economist who argues for new efforts to protect property rights in the developing countries is______.
a)Hernando de Soto
b)Jeff Sachs
c)William Easterly
d)Saskia Sassen
29) President Obama is more in favor of ______of the financial sector than President George W. Bush was.
a)regulation
b)deregulation
c)privatization
d)tax relief for the rich
30)Which country is the leading the world in the production of wind power turbines?
a)the United States
b)Iceland
c)India
d)China
Part II. Choose two essays (45 minutes each).
Write your answers in blue books.
- Identify the major international economic disputes that the United States is having currently with China, Western Europe, and the rest of the world. Try to isolate the major causes of these disputes and suggest ways that they might be peacefully resolved.
- Opponents of globalization argue that the world would be better off if we all got our goods and services from nearby vendors and suppliers rather than depending on goods and services produces thousands of miles away and delivered to us by the Internet, ocean-going vessels, and jumbo jets. Write an essay in which you speculate about how your life would be better or worse if you followed their advice. Are you a supporter or opponent of globalization?
- Thomas Friedman is sayingthat the world is becoming not just flat but also hot and crowded. He thinks the US needs to get busy with energy technology (ET) to catch up with the rest of the world. In particular, he thinks dirty fuels need to be replaced with clean electrons. What does this mean in practice? Do you agree with him? If so, why; if not, why not?
- PresidentObama has just appointed you as his chief advisor on international economic affairs and asked you to provide him with five policy reforms for the global economy that he can use in the next two years of his administration. Write a memo describing the reforms and justifying them. Be sure to include your best guesses about who will support and who will oppose them. How can the likely opposition forces be neutralized politically?
- The global economic crisis that we are currently experiencing had its origins in the bursting of a U.S. housing and construction bubble followed by a near collapse of the financial system. Why did this crisis spread so quickly to the rest of the world and what are its likely short-term and long-term consequences? Be sure to discuss the importance of globalization.
- Political economy deals with the interaction between political and economic forces. International political economy deals mainly with the interaction between global economic forces and the nation-state system. Are national governments more or less powerful than they were prior to the recent acceleration of globalization? Are other actors besides nation-states (e.g. international corporations or NGOs) becoming more or less powerful? In your essay, cite specific examples to support your argument.
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