AS.001.219 · Fall 2026

Syllabus

Twenty-six sessions across six modules. Tuesdays and Thursdays, 10:30–11:45 AM. First class: September 1. Last class: December 10.

Course information

Instructor
Simon D. Halliday
Email
simon.halliday@jhu.edu
Office hours
TBD — see Canvas
Meeting time
Tue & Thu, 10:30–11:45 AM
Location
TBD — Homewood Campus
Canvas
canvas.jhu.edu

Grades

Assignment Weight
Baltimore Progress Video (group) 30%
Progress Data Project (individual) 30%
In-class reading responses (handwritten, start of class) 15%
Participation & discussion leadership 15%
Opening & closing reflection 10%

Full descriptions of each assignment are on the Assignments page. AI use is expected and encouraged — each assignment includes an AI log component.

Key dates

First class
Tuesday, Sep 1
Add/drop deadline
Monday, Sep 11 (noon)
Rosh Hashanah
Tue Sep 22 — no class
Yom Kippur
Tue Sep 29 — no class
Last day to drop
Monday, Oct 12
Thanksgiving week
Nov 24 & Nov 26 — no classes
Last class
Thursday, Dec 10
Module 1

What Is Progress?

We begin with the data. How much has the world actually improved, and how do we know? We then ask what we should even be measuring — and whose definition of progress counts.

Tue Sep 1
Introduction: Why Progress?
Course overview. Opening reflection: "What do you think the world's biggest unsolved problem is, and why?" No assigned reading for today. Baltimore Video groups assigned; sites chosen by Thursday.
Opening reflection dueVideo groups assigned
Thu Sep 3
How Much Has the World Improved? Data and Instincts
Reading: Hans Rosling, Factfulness, Introduction + Chapters 1–2. Baltimore Video sites confirmed by end of this week; filming begins.
In-class responseVideo sites confirmed
Tue Sep 8
Measuring Wellbeing Beyond GDP
Reading: Amartya Sen, Development as Freedom, Chapter 2 (selections). What counts as progress when income is not enough?
In-class response
Thu Sep 10
The Great Enrichment: Capitalism and Transformation
Reading: Samuel Bowles & Simon D. Halliday, Understanding Our Economy, Chapter 3: "Our world transformed" (selections). Overview of how capitalism's institutions produced extraordinary growth — and at what cost.
In-class responseUOE Ch. 3
Module 2

Institutions & Innovation

Progress does not happen in a vacuum. Institutions — the rules, norms, and organizations that structure economic life — shape who innovates, who benefits, and who is left out.

Tue Sep 15
Science as a Public Good
Reading: Michael Polanyi, "The Republic of Science" (1962). How does the scientific community govern itself — and why does it matter for progress?
In-class response
Thu Sep 17
Innovation, Incentives, and Technology
Reading: Samuel Bowles & Simon D. Halliday, Understanding Our Economy, Chapter 4: "Innovation, incentives, and technology" (selections). How do incentives shape the direction and pace of innovation?
In-class responseUOE Ch. 4
Tue Sep 22
No class — Rosh Hashanah
Thu Sep 24
The Division of Labor and Its Discontents
Reading: Adam Smith, "Pin Factory," Wealth of Nations, Bk I, Ch. 1–3 (extract). Also: Charles Dickens, extract from Hard Times. Two visions of the factory system.
In-class responseBaltimore Video due
Tue Sep 29
No class — Yom Kippur
Thu Oct 1
Cities and Clusters: The Geography of Progress
Where does progress happen? Reading TBD — likely selection from Gordon, Rise and Fall of American Growth, and/or Glaeser on cities.
In-class responseBaltimore Video screening
Tue Oct 6
Escaping the Poverty Trap
Reading: Yuen Yuen Ang, How China Escaped the Poverty Trap, Chapter 2. How do poor societies bootstrap growth — and what does this mean for the role of the state?
In-class response
Module 3

Who Benefits?

Progress is uneven. Who gains, who is excluded, and what structures determine the distribution? We examine inequality, race, and the history of exclusion — in America and in Baltimore.

Thu Oct 8
Inequality and the Distribution of Progress
Reading TBD — options: Piketty excerpt on wealth inequality; Chetty on intergenerational mobility in America. Discussion: can growth coexist with rising inequality?
In-class response
Tue Oct 13
Race and Progress in America
Reading TBD — options: Richard Rothstein, The Color of Law (excerpt); Ta-Nehisi Coates, "The Case for Reparations" (condensed). What does it mean for progress to be racially exclusionary?
In-class response
Thu Oct 15
Baltimore: Industrial History and the Limits of Progress
Field visit — Baltimore Museum of Industry (BMI). Reading TBD — background on Baltimore's industrial and labor history. Students should begin thinking about Video assignment site choices.
BMI field visitVideo site choice due next week
Tue Oct 20
Redlining, Segregation, and the Spatial Geography of Exclusion
Reading TBD — focus on Baltimore. Connection to the Video assignment: choosing a site and understanding its history.
In-class responseVideo site groups confirmed
Thu Oct 22
Creative Progress: Art, Design, and the Florence Question
Reading: Dan Chiasson, "Man of the House" (New Yorker, Apr 29 2019) on Gropius and the Bauhaus. Optional: Ada Palmer, excerpts from Inventing the Renaissance (2025). Field visit context: Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA).
In-class response
Module 4

Ambition & Agency

Does progress flow from exceptional individuals or inevitable structural forces? What is the role of ambition, luck, and the systems that enable or suppress it?

Tue Oct 27
Great Men, Great Women, and Inevitable Inventions
Reading TBD — extract from Thomas Carlyle on the "Great Man" theory + a critical counterpoint on simultaneous invention (e.g., the telephone, calculus). Was Watt inevitable?
In-class response
Thu Oct 29
Ambition
Reading TBD — on the psychology and sociology of ambition. What drives people to make things? What stops them? Guest: TBD.
In-class response
Tue Nov 3
Guest: Political Economy of Reform
Guest speaker: Professor Steve Teles (Hopkins). Reading TBD — Teles's work on the political economy of institutional change and policy reform.
Guest speakerIn-class response
Thu Nov 5
Top-Down Innovation: The State, the Market, and Who Decides
Reading TBD — options: Mariana Mazzucato, "The Entrepreneurial State" (excerpt); case studies in government-led innovation (NASA, DARPA, the internet). When does state direction work?
In-class response
Tue Nov 10
Guest: Contemporary Science Policy
Guest speaker from the Institute for Progress (Washington DC). Reading TBD — context on science funding, metascience, and innovation policy.
Guest speakerVideo assignment draft due
Module 5

Limits & Risks

Progress can stall, reverse, or create new problems faster than it solves old ones. Climate change, pandemic risk, and technological disruption test whether the optimist story holds.

Thu Nov 12
Environmental Progress: Can We Fix What We Broke?
Reading: Hannah Ritchie, Not the End of the World (2024), Chapter 1: "Air Pollution" (~35 pp.). The evidence for environmental progress — and where it falls short.
In-class response
Tue Nov 17
When Progress Ends: Stagnation and Its Causes
Reading: Derek Thompson, "Why the Age of American Progress Ended," The Atlantic. Also: Tyler Cowen, "The Great Stagnation" (short excerpt). Is innovation slowing down — and why?
In-class response
Thu Nov 19
Catastrophic Risk: Pandemic, AI, and Existential Threats
Reading TBD — options: Nick Bostrom excerpt; post-pandemic review article; AI safety short reading. Discussion: what obligations does anticipated risk create?
In-class response
Tue Nov 24
No class — Thanksgiving week
No classes this week (Tuesday and Thursday both cancelled).
Thu Nov 26
No class — Thanksgiving
Module 6

Looking Forward

Students present their Data Projects and reflect on what they have learned. The final session returns to the opening reflection: how has your thinking changed?

Tue Dec 1
Data Project Presentations (Group 1)
Four presentations, 10 minutes each + Q&A. No advance reading assigned.
Data project presentations
Thu Dec 3
Data Project Presentations (Group 2)
Four presentations, 10 minutes each + Q&A. No advance reading assigned.
Data project presentations
Tue Dec 8
Data Project Presentations (Group 3) + Synthesis
Final presentations + open synthesis discussion. Reading: return to the Rosling from Session 2 — what looks different now?
Data project presentationsData project written report due
Thu Dec 10
Closing: What Kind of Progress Will You Make?
Students share their closing reflections (revisiting Week 1's opening prompt). No reading assigned. The seminar ends by looking forward.
Closing reflection due

A note on AI use

This seminar expects and welcomes thoughtful use of AI tools. Assignments are designed so that AI assistance produces better thinking, not a shortcut around it. Every major assignment includes an AI log: a brief account of how you used AI tools, what they produced, and how your own thinking differed from or built on the AI's output.

The goal is not to police AI use but to make it visible — so that you can develop a critical relationship with these tools, understanding both what they can do and what they cannot replace.