I you are required to write a 4000-word essay on a topic of your choice

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ESSAY ADVICE

So how do you write a really good essay? What are your examiners looking for? These are questions everyone is thinking about, or should be thinking about, before starting on the journey of writing their assessed essay. So here we provide some guidance on what examiners are looking for and include four key tips for writing a good essay. The tips which we explain below are as follows:

1. Answer the question 2. Have a clear structure 3. Adopt a good writing style: Use references and examples to

support points 4. Present an independent perspective and argument

So, we now explain each of these points in detail below:

ANSWER THE QUESTION

People sometimes get irritated about being told this but it is absolutely crucial to writing a good essay. What this means is that examiners don’t want you to just mention everything that is relevant to the topic they want to see you using research to clearly and explicitly answer the essay question. So here are the questions for International Business:

‘Attempts to ‘green’ capitalism, to make it ‘ecological’, are doomed by the very nature of the system as a system of endless growth’ (Bookchin, 1990). Do you agree with Bookchin’s assessment? Drawing on relevant studies and examples critically explain why. Discuss the importance of central banks in the global economy, with reference to cases such as the European Central Bank amongst others. Do central banks have too much political power, or is their power essential to avert future economic crises?

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‘With the value of bitcoin having fallen by around 70% since its peak late last year, the mother of all bubbles has now gone bust. More generally, cryptocurrencies have entered a not-so- cryptic apocalypse’ (Roubini, 2018). We are now three years on from Roubini’s statement and Bitcoin’s high market value has lasted longer than he anticipated. Do you think this disproves his arguments? Why or why not?

All of these questions are asking you to make an argument and develop your own perspective, based on your own research. Two of them are based on a quote, and the other question presents two contrasting views on the role of central banks. In the Introduction you need to state your basic argument. And also you then need to outline what you will focus on in the main part of the essay. Then in the main part you need to, on the basis of your own reading and research, decide on around three topics that are relevant to the question and that help you to answer it. So to give a mock example, lets say this was the essay question:

‘The charge is sometimes levelled—usually by manufacturing firms in the developed world, or their political allies—that China has achieved its industrial and export success by “cheating’’ (Kroeber, 2014). Do you think that critics of the Chinese economy are correct in this assessment?

Now this is NOT one of your essay questions but we are using it to provide an example of what a good essay might look like. In the Introduction we should try to clearly outline an overall argument in response to the question, such as:

‘While, as Kroeber argues, China is sometimes accused of cheating through selective subsidies and exchange rate manipulation, I would ultimately disagree with this perspective because historically speaking state intervention and protectionism has been characteristic of successful economies in terms of their economic development (see Chang, 2011). For example, selective protectionism helped the UK economy became dominant in the colonial era when it retained a number of protectionist measures (see Stein, 1984) and it was central

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to much of the success of the East Asian economies in the 1990s (Rodrik, 2011). Thus in my view, the argument that China is somehow cheating the global economy and this is why it has become an export powerhouse is misplaced and in the following sections I will outline why.’

That would be a good passage to have in the Introduction: You are clearly answering the question by summarizing your overall argument, note also that I have included some references to back up my basic arguments. I would then decide on three relevant topics to base my analysis around, such as:

- Chinese government subsidies - Intellectual property - State directed bank lending

Each of these three topics would be discussed in detail and I would explain, drawing on relevant research, why each of these issues is relevant to the essay question and how they help me to answer it. So that gives you an example of how to answer the question which should be the clear and explicit focus of any essay.

HAVE A CLEAR STRUCTURE

A clear structure is very important for the reader (that is, the examiner) because they will have lots of assignments to read and they want to read essays that are clear and easy to follow. As well as being well researched and well argued. So here is what you should be doing in the different sections: Introduction The Introduction is very important because (as noted above) the examiner has lots of assignments to mark and the Introduction is where you capture their attention and explain what you are going to do. So in a good Introduction you should:

- Set the context

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So for our pretend China question above you would say something like:

‘China’s economic performance since the 1990s has often been described as an export miracle (see for example Gilboy, 2004). It is now by most estimates the second largest economy in the world (Barboza, 2010). Yet this has led to increasing feelings of resentment amongst the previously dominant economies, most notably of course the US where President Trump is threatening to launch a trade war with China (Monaghan, 2019). Thus critically examining the question of whether China’s export performance is the result of some kind of ‘cheating’ or of somehow breaking the rules of the global economy warrants further critical interrogation.’

The above is an example of setting the context for your essay, in a sense it is about explaining why the question is important.

- Define and briefly explain the key terms and concepts After doing this you would also briefly explain the key terms in the question: Such as the idea of ‘green’ capitalism’, what bitcoin is, or why central banks are so important in the global economy.

- Present your argument In the introduction you also need to give a sense of what your overall argument is, as I have done above in the case of the question on China. Here is that passage again to give you an idea of what presenting your argument in the introduction might look like:

‘While, as Kroeber argues, China is sometimes accused of cheating through selective subsidies and exchange rate manipulation, I would ultimately disagree with this perspective because historically speaking state intervention and protectionism has been characteristic of successful economies in terms of their economic development (see Chang, 2011). For example, selective protectionism helped the UK economy became dominant in the colonial era when it retained a number of protectionist measures (see Stein, 1984) and it was central to much of the success of the East Asian economies in the 1990s (Rodrik, 2011). Thus in my view, the argument that China is somehow cheating the global economy and this is why it has become an export powerhouse is misplaced and in the following sections I will outline why.’

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- Outline what you will do in the different sections

In the final sentences of the introduction you need to outline what you are going to do in the different sections and explain why they are important, so giving an example, based on my mock essay question above, you might say something like:

‘I will begin the analysis by focusing on the Chinese government’s selective interventionism and the importance of this in providing a backbone for China’s future economic growth (Rodrik, 2011); I will then focus on China’s weak enforcement of intellectual property rights. While there is some evidence that intellectual property enforcement has been loose (Palmer, 2000). Intellectual property laws in international trade have only been adopted relatively recently and I would argue that they unfairly disadvantage developing countries (Rubtenberg, 2013). Finally, I will focus on the importance of state directed bank lending, which I argue has been crucial to driving China’s export performance (Walter and Howie, 2011). While some critics may dub these measures as ‘cheating’ as the quote suggests, here I argue that the adoption of these measures in China have been crucial to keeping the global economy afloat after the 2008 crisis and thus it is politically doctrinaire to label them as ‘cheating’.

So the introduction should be one long paragraph – no longer. And what you are doing is: setting the context; defining your terms; summarizing your argument; and outlining what you will do in the different sections. Main Part I would advise you to divide the main part of your essay into three or at most four topics, which you think are interesting and important and help you to answer the question You need to relate your discussion in these different sections back to the essay question you are answering. Explain why the material you discuss is relevant and why. Also don’t try and do too much, three or four topics is enough – do not feel that you need to mention everything that is relevant, it is better to focus on three or four relevant things, research them thoroughly and discuss them in detail.

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I would strongly recommend USING SUBHEADINGS for the different sections, this helps you to organize your material and makes it clear what you are discussing in the different parts of the essay. So in my mock China question the three subheadings would be:

- Chinese government subsidies - Intellectual property - State directed bank lending

Conclusion The Conclusion should be relatively brief, again no more than a paragraph, here you should return to your key argument and summarize why your analysis in the different sections supports your key argument. It is also good to point to the implications of your findings, so in the case of the mock essay you might say:

‘What the case of China highlights, rather than being an instance of cheating, is the importance of the state as a key actor in enabling effective market functioning and development. Indeed, the successes of the Chinese economy potentially provide lessons for other country governments to follow.’

That would be an example, of drawing out the implications of your analysis, which you should try and do in the last sentence or two of your conclusion. Bibliography Don’t forget to include full references of all the sources you have cited at the end in alphabetical order.

WRITING STYLE: Referencing and Examples

While examiners want to see you develop your own argument and perspective, to do this effectively you need to engage with other authors and provide evidence to support your argument. This also includes engaging with authors who you do not necessarily agree with and taking their arguments seriously.

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Referencing throughout (as I have done in the quotes above) is particularly important because: 1. It adds legitimacy to the points you are making. 2. It shows you have done independent research (which will improve your mark). 3. It means that you won’t be accused of plagiarism. So those are three very good reasons for referencing thoroughly and using Harvard referencing to back up key points throughout. Not referencing thoroughly will seriously damage your mark. Providing examples is also very important because they serve to illustrate your points and arguments and substantiate them. This is also a question of writing style because if you just say ‘I think its wrong to say China is cheating and is bad, it is too simplistic’ your style of writing is too anecdotal and it does not have sufficient supporting evidence. In a high level answer, you would say:

‘While there is a perception that China is somehow ‘cheating’ and this has risen to prominence through some of Trump’s pronouncements in recent months (Werner, 2018), we can question this analysis because historically advanced economies have often adopted protectionist measures when it was in their economic interests to do so (see Chang, 2011). For example, when the US left the gold standard in 1971 Roosevelt placed a 10% charge on imports (Irwin, 2011). This was an extremely protectionist measure but it was central to maintaining the dominant position of the US economy in the early 70s.’

As you can see the second option is far better because the same argument is being made in both, but in the second version the argument is backed up by referencing and a good historical example. A selective reading list has been included for each question on Blackboard but this is not an exhaustive list, you are also expected to do your own independent research. I recommend looking for relevant material on Google Scholar and looking at relevant sources in the Bibliography of each of the articles and books that you read to find more relevant sources that you can then include in your essay, provided they are relevant.

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You should also discuss sources that disagree with your own perspective, don’t just ignore them. Ideally you would say things about authors you disagree with like:

‘while …. … argues that ….. for the following reasons …. In my view we can question this analysis because….’

A couple of other dangers to be aware of regarding referencing and writing style:

1. Don’t become too reliant on one or two sources in good essays we expect a broad range of sources to be cited. We don’t want to see one source repeatedly used throughout a paragraph, it suggests that you have not done a broad enough range of reading.

2. Overly long paragraphs can damage your presentation: you should not generally have paragraphs that are longer than a page. I would say generally at most a paragraph should be three quarters of a page. Each time you change topic, start a new paragraph.

INDEPENDENT PERSPECTIVE & ARGUMENT One common mistake we see when marking essays is that students simply repeat what other author’s have said without making clear what their own argument or perspective is in response to the question. Whenever you use an author or a source of information we want you to explain how and why it is relevant to your essay question. One useful tip to avoid this is to try and avoid finishing a paragraph with a quote or reference, you need to explain at the end of a paragraph where you have used a number of references, why these points and examples are relevant to your question and your overall argument. Note that in my mock essay question answer above I have included a few examples of clearly stating my overall argument and perspective, to repeat one example from above:

‘While some critics may dub these measures as ‘cheating,’ as the quote suggests, here I argue that these measures have been crucial to keeping the global economy afloat after the 2008 crisis and thus it is politically doctrinaire to label them as ‘cheating’.

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Ideally your perspective and argument should be backed up by reasoning and evidence (through specific examples) throughout the essay and that is where independent research becomes so important. You also need to use existing research and examples throughout to support your argument.

So I hope this guidance helps, please see the reading list for some specific reading suggestions. And please email one of us if you would like to discuss your essay plans with us in advance. Please note that while we are willing to look at short plans of what you want to do in your essays, you will need to make an appointment and come and see us and that’s why its good to start planning your essays and doing research now, so you are not panicking later on. And you can then come and see us if you are confused or have any problems. Please also note that WE WILL NOT read draft essays because this would be unfair to other students. So…

Good luck, start early, & don’t panic