AØKK08409U Distributive Justice

Volume 2025/2026
Education

MSc programme in Economics – elective course

 

The course is open to:

  • Exchange and Guest students from abroad
  • Credit students from Danish Universities
  • Open University students
Content

The course is an introduction to economic approaches to justice and fairness from both theoretical and empirical perspectives.

The course starts with an introduction to welfare economics, the part of economics that addresses ethical issues.  This introduction will be framed as a discussion of the possibility for a society to aggregate different views on what is good.

The course also contains an introduction to empirical measurement of social welfare and inequality. This introduction will be framed around how to rank income distributions and Lorenz curves.

Finally, the course contains an introduction to intergenerational justice. This introduction will be framed around conflicts between the interests of the present and the interests of future generations. The course will also cover applications to the climate and population problems.

Learning Outcome

After completing the course the student is expected to be able to:

 

Knowledge:

  • Account for the challenge of measuring social welfare.
  • Reflect on the main approaches to distributional justice.
  • Compare different inequality indices and account for their strengths and weaknesses.

 

Skills:

  • Choose and assess the most appropriate approach to measuring social welfare for each economic problem.
  • Perform a sensible welfare analysis for understanding the effects of economic policies.
  • Undertake an analysis of inequality.

 

Competences:

  • Read and evaluate project reports and journal articles that make use of the concepts and methods that are introduced in the course.
  • Make use of the course content in your own academic work, for example in analyses that are part of the master’s thesis.

The syllabus consists of a selection of scientific papers by leading authors in the field. A detailed list of the syllabus will be posted in Absalon at the beginning of the course.

The students receive oral collective feedback during the lectures and exercises.
There is no recommended academic qualifications other than the requirements to the Master program in Economics.

The course assumes that the students have knowledge of
- Mathematics corresponding to the courses “Matematik A” and “Matematik B”: Integration (i.e. by parts), derivation and (basic) properties of functions.
- Statistics corresponding to the course “Sandsynlighedsteori”: Probability distributions and properties.
- Econometrics corresponding to the course “Econometrics I”: Basic knowledge of statistical inference.
The teaching will consist of a combination of lectures presenting the relevant theories and empirics and exercise classes involving applications and extensions of the theories and empirics presented in the lectures.
  • Category
  • Hours
  • Lectures
  • 42
  • Preparation
  • 161
  • Exam
  • 3
  • Total
  • 206
Oral
Collective
Credit
7.5 ECTS
Type of assessment
On-site written exam, 3 hours
Examination prerequisites

To qualify for the exam the student must no later than the given deadlines during the course:

  • Submit and have approved a mandatory term paper.
Aid
No aids allowed
Marking scale
7-point grading scale
Censorship form
No external censorship
An oral re-examination may be with external assessment.
Exam period

Exam information:

The examination date can be found in the exam schedule   here

More information is available in Digital Exam from the middle of the semester. 

More information about examination, rules, aids etc. at  Master (UK) and  Master (DK).

Re-exam

Oral reexam 20 minutes without preparation time.

No aids allowed during the examination.

 

  • To qualify for the re-exam, the student must submit and have approved a mandatory term paper by the specified deadlines during the course.

 

Reexam information:

The reexamination date/period can be found in the reexam schedule   here

More information in Digital Exam in August. More information at  Master UK) and  Master DK)

Criteria for exam assesment

Students are assessed on the extent to which they master the learning outcome for the course.

 

In order to obtain the top grade “12”, the student must with no or only a few minor weaknesses be able to demonstrate an excellent performance displaying a high level of command of all aspects of the relevant material and can make use of the knowledge, skills and competencies listed in the learning outcomes.

 

In order to obtain the passing grade “02”, the student must in a satisfactory way be able to demonstrate a minimal acceptable level of  the knowledge, skills and competencies listed in the learning outcomes.