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Are markets self-destructive without government intervention ?  It has to oppose the views of Keynes and Hayek on the general stability of markets

Sociology

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Are markets self-destructive without government intervention ? 

It has to oppose the views of Keynes and Hayek on the general stability of markets. A third part can be about Polanyi and his moderate/social view.

Political Economy: Approaches, Concepts and Issues

 

Generic essay guidance

 

The best answers tend to: 

 

• Present a clear argument in answer to the question asked 

 

• That is clearly signposted at the outset and developed through the essay

 

• That demonstrates knowledge of (some of) the thinkers discussed on the module by selecting the appropriate material from their work and critically engaging with it

 

• Present the strongest possible argument for their own position and the position they are criticising

 

• Test the theoretical and empirical claims of authors by using evidence from the real world

 

• End with a clear and concise conclusion that follows from the argument and evidence presented in the essay

 

In contrast, the weaker answers tend to: 

 

• Struggle to develop a coherent argument and/or reframe the question so that they answer a different, often easier, question

 

• Misunderstand or mischaracterise the arguments of key thinkers, usually by presenting a weak, ‘straw man’ version of their position

 

• Fail to critically engage with the thinkers presented, often seeming to assume that because an author said something then it must be in some way true

 

• Rarely use real world evidence to test theoretical or empirical claims

 

• End with an unclear conclusion, or a conclusion that did not obviously follow from the argument presented in the main body of the essay

 

 

In previous years the following feedback has been given on multiple occasions to essays which did not perform particularly well, and therefore we think it may be useful for all of you to see this feedback before submitting your essays: 

 

• Some essays did not include a discussion of the work of at least two authors discussed during the module; some essays only discussed the work of one of our authors, and there were even a few essays that did not include any discussion of the authors. Please always keep in mind that the assessed essays for your modules are meant to assess your knowledge of, and your ability to work with, the material of the module. It is good, and often very useful, to include additional material in your essay, but please always make sure that you build on the module material; that you demonstrate in your essay that you understand the material that was discussed in the module, and that you are able to work with it to answer a specific question. 

 

• There were a few essays that only focused on one side of the argument, not presenting the other side of the argument. There were also some essays that presented only a very weak version of the other side of the argument, rejecting that side of the argument immediately. The strongest academic essays are the ones that present both sides of the argument in the strongest terms possible; not the ones that present a very weak version of the position that is going to be rejected. The latter are much less convincing and can easily be criticised by means of the presentation of a strong version of the position that is rejected. The former are the most convincing essays: as they present a strong account of the position that is subsequently be rejected, they need to work very hard to critically assess and reject that position. If this is done well, it leads to arguments that are extremely convincing and difficult for the reader to criticise.

 

• There were quite a number of essays that did not include much of a critical assessment of the positions that were discussed. These essays would often neatly introduce the positions of (at least) two authors, and they would, in the process, cover the different sides of the argument, but they would fail to critically analyse the positions, moving immediately to the conclusions. Please keep in mind that the reader needs to be able to evaluate how convincing is your answer to the question – and thus how convincing is your position. If you do not include a critical assessment of the different positions – the different sides of the argument – the reader does not know how your conclusion has been derived, and thus cannot evaluate whether it makes sense. Your conclusion/ answer must follow logically from your critical assessment – including an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses – of the different positions. 

 

• There were quite a number of essays which spent a lot of words on elements of the work of our authors that are not – or at least not obviously – relevant to the essay question. Please always keep the essay (and exam) question in mind, and make sure that every single paragraph in your essay contributes – one way or another; directly or indirectly – to the answer to the particular question. Many of our authors cover a range of issues in their work, and not all of these are relevant to the essay question you are answering. 

 

• There were also a great number of essays which did not explain the positions of the authors well enough; essays that very concisely presented statements of the authors without elaborating on the argument or explaining where these statements came from. In particular, when statements of authors take a cause-effect form, you need to explain to the reader what the causal argument is; you cannot just state that author A argues that X leads to Y.