Organization version 991202
1999-2000 Philosophy of Economy
Code 360.025
2 SP
Semester 1
Lecturer: Bert hamminga
Prerequisites: None
Mode of instruction: 2 hours of lecture weekly (interactive)
Rated assignments; written examination.
Compulsory for International Business
Contents and objectives of the course
Business practices have changed enormously in history, and differ widely over contemporary
cultures. Though there is a clear tendency of global convergence of the parties on the
international market, this seemingly uniformity is deceiving if leading one to think that
the forces behind local supply to the world market are similar worldwide. In Slavic,
Sub-Sahara African, Western, South East Asian, and other countries, people work and
produce for different reasons, because their life has a different meaning to them. What is
generally associated with 'Philosophy' reveals the Western view on man, society and life.
In this course, we make an attempt to view 'Philosophy' from a kaleidoscopic, global,
cross cultural perspective, thus learning why dealing with suppliers from other cultures
requires some similar, but also some different capacities. Themes include: different
concepts of the 'individual', "family", the meaning of the business enterprise
to the individual agents organized in it, the meaning of ideas of reality, knowledge,
truth, rationality, and the meaning of life.
Required literature is listed on the page Lecture Notes
Assignments
Earlier versions of this page stated:
"I have rewards for assignments only in the first year. Now we are adults. That makes rewards unnecessarily bureaucratic. We just do them. All of them. Always. That is a matter of ethics. Good for you. Good for everybody. Be a morally strong person. You will end up not even needing exams!"
But, according to students, due to time pressure caused by rated assignments for other courses, even adults prove unable to steer on pure ethics, morals land responsibility. Hence, some assignments are now rated. The rules should be followed meticulously.
The danger of introducing rated assignment, as is done now, is that the unrated assignments might receive less priority. The student is advised that neglect of unrated assignments leads to inability to understand properly what is dealt with next in the course.
Rated assignments form an evil in university education. Are they necessary evil? This question is right in the scope of this course, so we shall deal with that and even have an assignment about it (see The Philosophy of Rated Assignments).
Rules for Rated assignments
All answers should be short and adequate.do as follows:
You will get a score 0 to 2 added to your score at the end exam of this course.
The end score will be on scale 1-10, there will be 3 rated assignments in total, so you
could at best start you final test at 6. That final test rates 0-4. The second test in the
summer rates 0-10, assignment scores have no validity. .
Your assignment should of course contain neither copies from the web nor from fellow
students, as my advanced matching software discovered last time......It should be your own
work that you are satisfied with (read: Capitalism
and Honesty).
Before the exam your total assignment score will be given and the relevant web pages will be frozen. This will be announced on this page, below. Until then, every web page might be modified (look at changing version dates in the headings and "planned additions" -but unplanned additions are not excluded!). The lecture hall is the place for creativity, the exam is not for creativity, but to test whether you actually did the hard work.
Frozen for exams: Yes!
Alternative date for exam:
Those how who have other tasks in their IB education schedule at the time of the
exam can apply for oral exam. Mail your IB education schedule to me hamminga@kub.nl.
Personal problems, quests for special treatment
Do not mail me personal problems and quests for special treatment. I have
hundreds and hundreds of students and no assistence, so you are not likely to get an
answer. In such cases go to the student adviser to ask for a license for special
treatment. With this license come to me in the lecture hall (intermission or ending).
Problems with rated assignment phec5
In sending rated assignment phec5, there turned out to be delivery failures "mailbox full" messages even after the my mailbox hamminga@kub.nl had been cleared on Oct 6. My operator ICO is working at a possible enlargement. Meanwhile the box is cleared again and now should work. Those whose confirmation of receipt was not on the lists I brought to the lecture hall are asked to mail again Thursday Oct 14. At lecture 7 Oct 27, I will bring a list of persons whose assignment I received, for students to check. That list shall be on the net on Oct 27 before 18:00hrs.