Partner and other Collaborative Institutions

One of the Programme's most attractive features is that it is a collaborative venture between eight top class Scottish Universities. Besides Edinburgh, the Programme draws on the teaching and research expertise of the Economics Departments of Aberdeen, Dundee, Glasgow, Heriot Watt, St Andrews, Stirling and Strathclyde Universities. Finally, the Programme has close links with Scotecon, an organisation funded by the Scottish Executive to conduct research in Scottish economic policy.  Below are brief descriptions of all the participating institutions together with links to their webpages and to further information.

Aberdeen University Department of Economics/Health Economics Research Unit

The economics department at the University of Aberdeen is an extremely active, lively, friendly and dynamic environment. The department has a complement of roughly twenty members, plus a number of research fellows and assistants. The department's research strengths are labour economics, health economics, experimental economics and energy economics. Other areas with active researchers include macro- and micro-economic theory, economics of finance, agricultural economics, urban and regional economics and environmental economics. The department's strong tradition and interest in labour economics led to the launch of the Centre for European Labour Market Research (CELMR) in 2000. This centre provides a focus for those with an interest in labour economics. The centre also provides access to a wide variety of data sources plus a dedicated research assistant to assist in data manipulation and preparation. The members of the centre have been extremely successful in attracting external grants. In 2007, the department opened the Scottish Experimental Economics Laboratory (SEEL), a dedicated state-of-the-art purpose-built computer laboratory with 28 terminals used by experimental economists as well as by researchers in other disciplines wishing to use experimental methods for their own work. Given the geographical location of Aberdeen it is not surprising that the department also has a long tradition and interest in energy and in particular petroleum economics. There is an active seminar series in economics for external speakers, together with a more informal lunchtime workshop series for work in progress, as well as dedicated Ph.D. presentations. Post-graduate students are fully integrated into all economics department activities. They are provided with office space and access to a desktop; every year a one-day Economics Ph.D. conference is organised for them to showcase their work to all members of the department and externals. The department has a very successful record in Ph.D. supervision. For more information please visit the department website http://www.abdn.ac.uk/economics/

The Health Economics Research Unit (HERU) was established in 1977 at the University of Aberdeen. HERU is part of the Division of Applied Health Sciences (DAHS) in the College of Life Sciences and Medicine and has strong links with the economists in the University of Aberdeen Business School. HERU currently employs 26 research staff. HERU undertakes two distinct programmes of research: Preference Elicitation and Assessment of Technologies (PEAT) and Behaviour, Health and Health Systems (BHHS). The PEAT Programme undertakes research to improve the efficiency of health care delivery. This is achieved by bringing together information on the process, outcomes and resource implications of health care technologies. The BHHS Programme focuses on how incentives and constraints influence behaviour, including the behaviour of the health care workforce, the behaviour of NHS organisations and the health behaviour of individuals. Research on the (cost-) effectiveness of interventions aimed at lifestyle changes or reducing health inequalities is also undertaken. Enquiry into and development of micro-econometric methods underpins this research. Further details of the Unit's activities can be found at www.abdn.ac.uk/heru.

Dundee University Department of Economics

The study of Economics as a serious enterprise goes back to the Dundee School of Economics, founded in 1931. Of the many distinguished economists who were members of the Dundee School, the most famous name is that of Nobel Laureate, Ronald Coase.Today, the Department is committed to preserving that tradition of excellence in research, scholarship and teaching. Our main focus is on applied economics and economic policy. Members of the Department are all actively engaged in research in these areas and seek to enliven and inform their teaching through their own scholarship. Many of the modern debates to which students will be exposed are those in which their teachers have made an active contribution.The Department is proud of the success of its own members, many of whom have high international reputations. We are equally proud of the success of so many of our graduates and postgraduates in many different walks of life - the civil service, industry, finance and academia.

For more information please visit the department website http://www.dundee.ac.uk/econman/

Edinburgh University Department of Economics

Edinburgh has long been a major centre for the study of Economics. In the eighteenth century, the age of the Scottish Enlightenment, economics was a prominent interest in the city with David Hume, James Stuart, Adam Smith and Dugald Stewart all playing a part in Edinburgh's intellectual life. Political economy was initially taught as a single course. In 1892 it became a component of the new MA Ordinary degree; an Economics honours degree was introduced in 1898. The first Economics graduates, two in number, received their degrees in 1902: now there are over 100 MA graduates annually. Postgraduate teaching took off in the mid-1950s and is now part of the Scottish Graduate Programme in Economics. Many staff currently at the university are leaders in their field. For example John Hardman Moore is generally recognised to be one of the leading micro-theorists of his generation. Moore and other academics such as Hopkins, Sakovics and Thomas regularly publish in the top five economics journals (American Economic Review, Econometrica, Quarterly Journal of Economics, Review of Economic Studies, Journal of Political Economy).

For more information please visit the department website http://www.econ.ed.ac.uk

Glasgow University Department of Economics

The study of Economics at Glasgow, like the University itself (which was founded in 1451), has a long and distinguished history . Perhaps its most famous student was Adam Smith, writer of "The Wealth of Nations" and founding father of the modern social science now known as Economics. A distinction in Economics research continues to the current day. In particular, the current Department has a significant international research profile in the fields of macroeconomics, international economics, econometrics, and development economics. Within macroeconomics, there are particular interests in macroeconomic theory and policy (with an ESRC-financed research project on Monetary and Fiscal Policy Interactions); the determinants of productivity growth and growth theory (with a recently completed ESRC-financed research project on business cycles and growth); the fiscal theory of the price level; macroeconomic adjustment and labour markets (with a collaborative ESRC funded project on effects of Devolution); monetary economics and financial markets. In addition, the Department has recently completed its involvement in a collaborative ESRC-financed macro-modelling project. In international economics, our recent research has focused particularly on strategic trade theory, regional integration and factor mobility, export insurance, and the trade performance of the Asian NIEs. Our research focus in development economics has been in areas such as human development indices and the role of structural adjustment programmes in developing country growth.

For more information please visit the Department website http://www.gla.ac.uk/departments/economics/index.html

Heriot-Watt Department of Economics/Centre for Economic Reform and Transformation

To do their work effectively, economists need to be able to understand the complex nature of the economics problems which face late 20th century societies. Unemployment, taxation, trade flows, third world development, pollution, and political and economics restructuring in former communist countries are some of the problems on which economists at Heriot-Watt University are working. Heriot-Watt economics graduates are highly successful in finding jobs in banking, insurance, investment analysis, accountancy, manufacturing industry, the civil service, the armed forces, the police and even undertaking! An increasing proportion of our graduates go on to take higher degrees at home or abroad where they find themselves adequately prepared for advanced study. The Economics Department is located in a modern building with good computing and library facilities. An excellent relationship prevails between staff and students. The atmosphere is informal and friendly, and the staff display a genuine concern for students' academic progress and general well-being. The department provides a lively and stimulating environment of enquiry and debate. There are 15 economics teaching staff and some 200 undergraduate students. Teaching is supported by links with a research unit investigating the transformation of Eastern European economies and by the varied research interests of the staff.

Established in 1990, the research of the Centre for Economic Reform and Transformation focuses on the emerging economies of Central and Eastern Europe,
the former Soviet Union and East Asia.
CERT is active in a wide range of research and consultancy activities, and also offers educational opportunities for postgraduate students and visiting scholars.

For more information please visit the department website http://www.sml.hw.ac.uk/Ecoverview.htm

or the CERT website http://www.sml.hw.ac.uk/cert/

St Andrews University Department of Economics

Economics has a long history at the University, it was first taught (as Political Economy) some time before 1826 by Prof. Thomas Chalmers. The modern School was recently rated the ninth (equal) best in the UK by Times Higher Educational Supplement (9th May 2003). We achieved the highest possible rating in the last two external evaluations of our teaching quality and were awarded a 4 in the last research assessment exercise.

The School is home to two research centres, the Centre for Research into Industry, Enterprise, Finance and the Firm (CRIEFF) and the Centre for Dynamic Macroeconomics (CDMA).

For more information please visit the department website http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/academic/economics/index.shtml

Stirling University Department of Economics

The Economics Department at Stirling provides a friendly, supportive environment for research and teaching. The Department is committed to high-quality research and research leadership (within the UK and in the international arena), with all teaching staff research actice. The research community is further enhanced by the contributions of research fellows and research postgraduates, and there are regular staff seminars and workshops. The Department has relative strength in four areas. A substantial proprotion of research is in the areas of money, banking and finance (eg measurement of expected inflation, micro credit, and the regional impact of monetary policy) and labour economics (eg research on wages and incomes, labour utilisation, poverty and economic demography, and comparative international markets). The new Stirling Centre for Economic Methodology (SCEME) provides a focus for research and dissemination on such topics as theories of knowledge, individual rationality and pluralism; this work is further supported by research in the field of history of thought. The fourth area of research strength is the Scottish economy, with research being conducted within the Scotland-wide scotecon network which is located at Stirling. Given the subject matter (eg health, education, demographics, the environment), there is increasing scope for interdisciplinary research, within the University and more widely in Scotland.

For further information please consult the Department's website

Strathclyde University Department of Economics

The Department of Economics at Strathclyde is one of the largest in the UK. Undergraduate study opportunities are provided through the University's flexible BA programmes in Arts & Social Sciences and in Business and each year over 100 students from 25 countries study Economics at Honours level.

The Department's postgraduate portfolio includes Research degrees of DBA, PhD and MPhil and taught MSc courses in Economic Management and Policy and International and Financial Economics. The Department contributes also to the University's popular Masters/Postgraduate Diploma in Finance. The Department has 18 academic and 10 research-contract staff, with around 20 students currently registered for a research degree in Economics. It attracted a 4-rating in the 1996 Research Assessment Exercise.

For further information please consult the Department's website

http://www.strath.ac.uk/economics/