FIN 3504: Global Context of Business: South Africa
4 advanced management credits
A core intention of this course is to present to participants the real-life workings of the business, finance and industry structure of an emerging country-economy, using South Africa as an engaging study, and contrasting these with the more familiar business environments and practices as encountered in advanced (western) country-economies. In using the country of South Africa as a case study, participants will see the entire Africa continent, with all its 54 countries, 1.2 billion people (17% of the world’s population), $3trillion GDP, in context.
The course will look at South Africa and the continent through the lens of a business investor exploration. Using 52 developing countries of Africa as background, we will explore and analyze the major aspects of their finance and economic environments over a combined period of more than 15 years. In so doing, various mechanisms, concepts and theories will be introduced, explained and utilized at every step. This way, the student becomes acquainted with the intricacies of emerging country business, finance and economic environments in a practical and profound manner that involves real-life economic and business scenarios. Not only will the student learn and grasp international finance, economic and international business concepts and theories, they also will learn how these work and when to deploy them.
Participants will see how the business approaches and concepts they gather in their other Babson courses translate into and adapt to a totally different and unique socio-economic context. More specific details can be seen in the Course Content and Methodology section below, where the program’s Taught Content (usually classroom) and Experienced Content (in-country corporate interactions, etc) are outlined.
Prerequisites: (FME 1000 and FME 1001) or (MOB 1010 and EPS 1000)