Financial Crises: Policy and Regulation (LAWS90300)

What might trigger the next financial crisis: climate change, country-specific factors, FinTech, or Artificial Intelligence?

The subject introduces students to the causes and consequences of financial crises by drawing on interdisciplinary insights from economics, finance, psychology and the law.

We examine the factors that give rise to financial crises as well as explore their economic, social, political and legal consequences, and the resulting policy, legal and regulatory responses.

In this subject we will take an historical and case study-based approach, examining a series of financial crises that have had a lasting impact from the South Sea Bubble in 1720, to the Great Crash of 1929, the Asian Financial Crises of 1997, and the Global Financial Crisis of 2008.

Intended learning outcomes

On completion of this subject, students should be able to:

• Critically examine the factors that have given rise to financial crises in the past and assess the extent to which similar factors may be operative today and in the future;
• Analyse and assess the impact of policy, legal and regulatory responses to financial crises and the legal and regulatory instruments that have been used to address them;
• Analyse and integrate economic, financial and legal theories and concepts from an interdisciplinary perspective;
• Inspect the policy, legal and regulatory discourses concerning financial crises and interpret and appraise the responses to financial crises.

Generic skills

• Mastery of principal areas of policy, law and regulation as they relate to financial crises and the way in which the risks of financial crises are managed;
• Expert, specialised cognitive and technical skills for critical and independent thought and reflection in the context of financial crises;
• Problem-solving skills, applied to the critical evaluation of policy responses and legal and regulatory instruments relevant to financial crises; and
• The ability to communicate specialised and complex information, ideas, concepts and theories relevant to financial crises.