Did capitalism emerge in the city or the countryside?

Introduction to Business and Society SOSC 1340/1349 A and B, 2015-16 Essay 1 Due: December 3 (B) or 4 (A), in lecture Length: 6-8 pages Value: 30 marks (out of 150) Late essays will be subject to a -2% penalty per day. Planning Your Essay The essay writing process involves several stages: formulating a working thesis, organizing your notes and constructing an essay plan. Once you have picked an essay topic and identified the course readings you will need to use, look up the reading questions and ‘wikiwords’ corresponding to these readings in the course outline. Apply the SQ3R reading method to ‘social scientific’ texts or the ‘levels of reading analysis’ to the ‘creative’ texts. This will help you produce the notes that will form the raw materials for your essay. For help in designing your essay plan, and for further details on the ‘pre-writing’ stage, see Shea and Whitla chapter 10. If you don’t have a plan, your essay will lack direction and focus. Now that you have your notes and your essay plan, see chapter 11 for valuable tips on the writing stage. Producing a draft at least a few days before the due date will give you an opportunity to edit your work and improve readability. The more effort you put into each stage of the essay writing process, the better your essay will be. Instructions Pick one of the essay topics below. DO NOT simply answer the questions in the order that they appear in the topic. The order of presentation is something you need to think deeply about: you need to think about what it is that you want to say and the order that it would be best to say it in to show how well you understand the concepts, issues and arguments under consideration. Papers should be double spaced, with 12 point font (Times New Roman, Arial or Cambria are common ones) and one inch margins. Use paragraph format and provide a title page and a bibliography. Each page of your essay must be numbered. Formal Requirements Essays must include a title page (include your name, student number, TAs name and submission date) and a properly formatted bibliography. You will need to find and use two secondary ACADEMIC sources for this essay (no Wikipedia, dictionary.com, etc.). Your essay must start with a comprehensive introduction which includes: i. The position the author takes on the key question; ii. Your thesis; and iii. An explanation of how your essay will be organized. Your essay must have a clear paragraph structure, each starting with a clear topic sentence. Prior to starting this essay, students should complete the following two ‘modules’. *You are required to complete the SPARK module on Academic Integrity at: http://www.yorku.ca/spark/academic_integrity/index.html *You are required to complete the SPARK module on selecting sources at: http://www.yorku.ca/spark/books_journals_more/index.html Essay Topics 1. Did capitalism emerge in the city or the countryside? What ‘social property relations’ were necessary for the development of capitalism? Why did they develop in agrarian communities? How do these differ from pre-capitalist relations according to Wood? How did relations between ‘appropriators’ and ‘producers’ become so market dependent? 2. ‘Is a wealthy nation a prosperous nation?’ What is the ‘division of labour’ and how did it shape social relations both within and outside the factory? Use Heilbroner’s concept of the ‘drive for capital’ and how it simultaneously produces ‘wealth’ and ‘misery’ to analyze EITHER Dickens’ OR Sinclair’s insights into the nature of industrial life in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. 3. Are democracy and the ‘free market’ allies or rivals? How does Phillips define ‘political economy’ and how can it help us understand our ‘everyday life’? How does he integrate an analysis of ‘power’ into an economic analysis of the role of markets? What neoliberal arguments are made to justify privatization, de-regulation and trade liberalization? How does Phillips’ critique of the market system represent a response to these? 4. Is ‘free labour’ more profitable than slave labour? Examine William’s analysis of the role played by African slavery in the development of capitalism in the New World. Why were African slaves preferred over indigenous (native) slaves and indentured (white European) servants? Compare Williams’ analysis of the economic realities of staple crop production in the New World with the colonial moral ideal of ‘bringing light (civilization) into darkness (savagery)’ in Conrad’s work.