Marron Courses Fall 2017

Next fall, NYU’s Wilf Family Department of Politics will offer two new courses taught by faculty members of NYU’s Marron Institute of Urban Management. These graduate-level courses are open to graduate students outside of Politics as well. Undergraduate students are welcome to register by obtaining permission from the instructor through the Marron Institute. For additional information, please contact: marron.institute@nyu.edu or call (212) 992 - 6839.

TOPICS IN URBAN MANAGEMENT (POL-GA2334)

Criminal justice; environmental health; drug policy; rapid urbanization; mobility; job creation; fiscal sustainability: these are a few of the pressing challenges faced by cities around the globe. This course, led by the principal scholars at the Marron Institute of Urban Management, will enable students to develop informed opinions about urban policy, to defend those opinions with good analysis, and to understand the logic behind differing perspectives. Lecturers will include: public policy scholars Angela Hawken and Mark Kleiman, environmental health scientist Kevin Cromar, legal scholar Clayton Gillette, and urban planner Shlomo Angel.

Lead Instructor: Kevin Cromar
Tuesdays, 2:00 PM - 4:30 PM
4 Credits

Draft Syllabus

METHODS OF POLICY ANALYSIS (POL-GA2373)

Policy analysis is the discipline of thought that considers how to make and implement policy choices in the public interest. Policy analysis is a pragmatic discipline: it uses the social and natural sciences as inputs, but its principal output is advice to decision-makers (including citizens) rather than new theoretical or empirical knowledge. Led by one of America’s foremost public policy scholars, Professor Mark Kleiman, this course will focus on techniques for comparing the advantages and disadvantages of policy options: benefit-cost analysis, cost/effectiveness analysis, discounting (choice over time), and decision analysis (choice under uncertainty). In each case, we will be measuring achievable outcomes against one another, rather than against some imagined ideal, asking always the policy analyst’s stock question: “Compared to what?” 

Lead Instructor: Mark Kleiman
Mondays, 12:00 PM - 2:00 PM & Wednesdays, 12:00 PM - 1:20 PM
4 Credits

Draft Syllabus