EEA Award for Innovation in Teaching

Wheeler Institute for Business and Development at London Business School for the African History through the lens of Economics lecture series.

Over 27,000 people from over 160 countries and 1,000 universities and academic institutions participated in the African History through the Lens of Economics online course developed by London Business School’s Wheeler Institute for Business and Development.
 
The course, the first of its kind, delivered as an open-access learning experience, combined insights into cutting-edge research on African economic history and political economy. It brought together a large, diverse, and engaged community of individuals worldwide to learn evidence-based practices to address Africa’s challenges. Remarkably, 77% were drawn from the African Continent.
 
The core teaching team – Elias Papaioannou, Professor of Economics, London Business School, who led the course development, Stelios Michalopoulos, Eastman Professor of Economics, Brown University, Nathan Nunn, Frederic E. Abbe Professor of Economics, Harvard University, and Leonard Wantchekon, Maddison Professor of Politics and International Affairs, Princeton University – was joined by close to thirty guest speakers and twenty collaborators who acted as moderators and teaching assistants. Besides, the team, working with doctoral students from London Business School, Brown University, and the University of Zambia, run review sessions, delving into the material, addressing technical issues, and going over research ideas.
 
The course took the attendees on a journey through the history of Africa, addressing subjects such as precolonial political and social organizations, the slave trades, the 'Scramble for Africa’, colonisation, and independence movements. The course presented both historical and modern datasets, including geospatial data, archival material, anthropological maps, and social narratives, discussing in depth how researchers across social sciences can use these sources. The course offered several opportunities to highlight interdisciplinary research in areas such as the legacy of private concessionary companies during colonization, Christian missionaries, prison labor, colonial tax policies, the impact of foreign aid, the psychology of Africans, and the future of Africa.
 
African History through the Lens of Economics drew on the core teaching team research, as well as Elias Papaioannou’s ongoing research project on African colonisation, funded by a European Research Council Consolidator Grant and supported by the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) and the Structural Transformation and Economic Growth (STEG) Initiative. It offered an unparalleled opportunity to hear from various academics at various stages of their careers and from different institutions.

Motivation from Award Committee:: The panel were impressed with the Wheeler Institute’s "African History through the lens of Economics" project and with the large number of people that the project has reached and could potentially impact. It has already reached over 25 thousand people across many countries and the unique contribution it brings to the economics profession and accessibility of economics research was considered to be hugely valuable by the awarding panel.

Runners-Up

• Andrés Maroto, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid for the Digital Educational Escape Rooms (DEER) for teaching Economic Theory in the Higher Education.
   
• David Stolin, Toulouse Business School for Communicating Cutting-Edge Economics Research Through Interviews With Comedians

Award Committee : Maria Guadalupe (INSEAD), Meg Meyer (University of Oxford) and Pedro Rey Biel (ESADE)

Graduate Applications International Network (GAIN) for their support of prospective graduate students from all countries across Africa applying for MsC and PhD programs in economics and related fields, who are largely under represented. GAIN supports graduate applicants through information sharing, mentoring, peer-to-peer support, and reduction of financial barriers, with the goal of strengthening the pipeline for African students into the economics profession.

Honorary Mentions: 
CTaLE
Florian Oswald

Award Committee : Maria Guadalupe (INSEAD), Meg Meyer (University of Oxford) and Pedro Rey Biel (ESADE)