Estudia

1. From Business Models to Value Architecture. This chapter introduces the business model as a practical representation of how an organisation creates, delivers and captures value. The Business Model Canvas is examined as a selective, firm-centred representation of the value proposition, participants, operating activities, selected flows and internal financial viability. Students then develop the broader Value Architecture framework through seven analytical layers: promise and participant structure; operating engine; material, financial, informational and regulatory flows; internal viability and value capture; structural conditions of viability; distribution of benefits, burdens, risks and control; and dynamics of reproduction, pressure and change.

2. Diagnosing Sustainability through Value Architecture This chapter introduces sustainability as a diagnosis of the conditions on which a value architecture depends and the consequences it produces. Students examine ecological ceilings, social floors, critical and non-substitutable conditions, and the distinction between weak and strong sustainability. Particular attention is given to the distribution of benefits, burdens, risks and decision-making power, as well as to scale, rebound effects and the depth of organisational responses to ecological and social pressures.

3. Liberal Capitalism and the Logics of Capital Growth This chapter examines liberal capitalism as a value regime organised by the systemic pressure to reproduce and expand capital. It introduces the historical and institutional foundations of capital growth and its relationship with market dependence, competition, investment, wage labour, finance and colonial expansion. Students analyse six recurring configuration logics through which capital growth is pursued: scale, speed, coordination, recurrence, symbolic differentiation and legitimation under critique.

4. Communism and Post-socialist Value Trajectories This chapter studies communism as a distinct value regime that reorganised property, authority, coordination, production, distribution and collective provision through political planning. It then examines the internal pressures of this regime and three major historical trajectories: planned persistence; market reform with political continuity; and politically mediated capitalist recomposition. Students compare planned productive structures, strategic state enterprises, national champions, politically exposed corporations and market-facing architectures across these trajectories.

5. Pre-capitalist Lineages and Non-capitalist Worlds of Value This chapter explores contemporary worlds of value whose organising principles predate capitalist expansion and are not primarily governed by the reproduction and growth of capital. Value is validated through its contribution to the viable reproduction of historically situated relational life. Students examine how territory, mobility, ecological knowledge, kinship, collective maintenance, authority and reciprocal obligations organise economic activity and social continuity. These worlds are approached as living and changing formations that persist through adaptation, articulation and recomposition. The chapter compares configuration logics based on protected limits, viable mobility, navigable connection, collective maintenance, layered order and articulation across different normative and institutional orders.

6. Uneven Capitalist Incorporation across the Global South This chapter examines how the expansion of capital has entered, reorganised and combined with pre-existing worlds of value across different regions of the Global South. Students analyse how capital growth becomes structurally decisive through historically uneven processes of incorporation, while earlier institutions, relations and livelihood systems persist, become subordinated or are recombined. Four major trajectories are compared: commodity-dependent incorporation, strategic-rent incorporation, developmentalist incorporation and plural-networked incorporation.

7. Transformations and Futures Beyond Growth This chapter examines emerging value formations that respond to ecological limits, social inequalities, care crises, extractivism and the exclusion of communities from shaping their own futures. Students compare post-growth configurations based on shared sufficiency, care-centred reproduction and public-commons transition; pluriversal configurations based on territorial autonomy and post-extractivist rebuilding; and forms of reclaimed futurity based on collective future-making. Regeneration is assessed through the capacity to restore and expand the ecological, social, territorial and imaginative conditions of collective viability.

8. Final Integrative Synthesis: Applying Value Architecture to Complex Fields. The course concludes by integrating the analytical tools developed across the seven chapters. Students examine complex fields in which several Value Architectures, regimes, trajectories or configurations operate simultaneously and make different claims on shared resources, institutions and conditions. They compare promises and reproduction logics, select the most decisive VA1–VA7 relations, diagnose ecological ceilings, social floors, burdens, authority and first protection under pressure, and formulate a coherent and justified governance judgement. This final synthesis prepares students to apply the complete course framework independently to an unfamiliar case.

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Activitats d'avaluació:

All assessment activities will be graded on a scale from 0 to 10 according to the activity-specific criteria and instructions provided in advance.

Across the different activities, grading will consider conceptual accuracy; the appropriate selection and interpretation of evidence; the correct and justified use of Value Architecture and of the relevant value regimes, historical trajectories and configuration logics; the quality of sustainability diagnosis; the coherence of analytical reasoning and governance judgement; and the clarity and precision of communication.

The final grade will be calculated as the weighted combination of the six assessment activities according to the percentages indicated in the assessment table.

The grade awarded to each Team Portfolio submission will be included in an individual student’s final grade only when the corresponding individual verification confirms their understanding of and contribution to the submitted work. Verification is binary and carries no additional mark. Where verification is not confirmed, the student will receive a grade of 0 for the corresponding portfolio submission.

Criteris específics de la nota «No Presentat»:
Students will receive a “No Show” grade only when they have neither completed nor submitted any graded continuous assessment activity and have not taken the single assessment.
Once a student has completed, submitted or attended any graded assessment activity, the final result will be calculated numerically according to the assessment activities completed.

Avaluació única:
Students who formally opt for single assessment within the established period will complete one integrated individual written examination during the official assessment period.

A case dossier will be distributed in advance so that students can become familiar with its evidence and context. No prior written submission will be required. The specific examination questions will be provided during the supervised examination.

The two-hour written examination will consist of:

1. Conceptual understanding of Value Architecture and sustainability diagnosis: 15%.
2. Conceptual understanding of the value regimes, historical trajectories and configuration logics covered in Chapters 3 to 7: 25%.
3. Individual configuration case analysis: 25%.
4. Short analytical transfer task equivalent to the Global Week component: 5%.
5. Integrated individual analysis of a complex field, including comparison of relevant Value Architectures, sustainability diagnosis and a justified governance judgement: 30%.

The conceptual sections will combine selected-response questions and short analytical micro-cases. The case-based sections will use structured questions requiring students to identify and justify relevant Value Architectures, regimes, trajectories or configurations, select decisive evidence through VA1–VA7, analyse sustainability tensions and shared or contested conditions, and formulate a coherent and justified governance judgement.

The final grade will be calculated through the weighted combination of all sections. No minimum grade is required in any individual section. The single assessment is passed with an overall grade of at least 5.0 out of 10.

Because the single assessment represents 100% of the final grade, it is recoverable through an equivalent integrated written examination during the official resit period.

Requisits mínims per aprovar:
To pass the course, students must obtain an overall weighted final grade of at least 5.0 out of 10.
No minimum grade is required in any individual assessment activity. Grades obtained in the different assessment components may compensate for one another according to their established weighting.
None of the continuous assessment activities is recoverable.

Individual and team tutorials may be arranged by appointment. They may be used to clarify conceptual difficulties, discuss questions arising from the Guided Case Workshops, support the development of Team Portfolio 1: Comparative Configurations and Team Portfolio 2: Worlds of Value and Capitalist Incorporation, prepare for the individual Portfolio Verifications, address justified individual circumstances, or discuss learning progress and assessment preparation.

Moodle will be the main communication platform for the course. It will be used to publish Case Preparation materials, analytical worksheets, Concept Notes, Team Portfolio instructions, case dossiers, assessment guidance, deadlines, grades and general announcements. Students are expected to consult Moodle regularly.
General questions relevant to the whole class should normally be raised during class or through Moodle. Questions involving personal circumstances, individual assessment records or confidential matters should be sent by institutional email.

Students may use generative AI tools as part of their learning process for purposes such as exploration, idea generation, clarification, language support or preliminary comparison, unless the instructions for a particular activity establish specific limitations.

Any permitted use of AI in assessed work must be transparent and follow the instructions provided for the activity. Students remain fully responsible for the accuracy of the information, the reliability of references, the selection and interpretation of evidence, and the analysis and arguments submitted under their name.

AI tools may support the learning process, but they may not replace the student’s or team’s own analytical work, contextual reasoning or critical judgement.

All students will complete an individual Portfolio Verification for each Team Portfolio submission: Team Portfolio 1: Comparative Configurations and Team Portfolio 2: Worlds of Value and Capitalist Incorporation. Each verification carries no additional mark and confirms or does not confirm the validity of the corresponding team grade for the individual student.