The Center provides new opportunities for students at Rutgers and partnering universities to learn about the deepening global economy through both academic study and first-hand experience. 

Leveraging International Partnerships

Summer study abroad program in Germany: 

Photo of Univ. Duisburg-EssenThe Center has spearheaded an exciting opportunity for Rutgers students to attend the Global and Transnational Sociology Summer School at Germany’s University of Duisburg-Essen. This two- to four-week program provides students a chance to experience Germany and Europe while earning credits through courses in comparative and transnational studies. 

Photo of Univ. Alliance RuhrThis program is part of Rutgers’ broader collaboration with the University Alliance Ruhr (including Duisburg-Essen, Ruhr University Bochum, and TU Dortmund University). As part of this cooperation, the Center has also supported a summer school for German students visiting New York and New Jersey as part of the University Alliance Ruhr’s Transatlantic Ruhr Fellowship.



Partnerships with universities in China: 

Photo of East China Univ. of Science and TechnologyThe Center continues to build important relationships with Chinese universities. In 2017, Rutgers and the Business School of East China University of Science and Technology (ECUST) formally launched SMLR’s Master Courses Certificate Program for international MBA students of ECUST. Each year, SMLR offers six courses at ECUST, covering a range of topics in industrial relations and human resources.

Since the launch of the Master Courses Certificate Program, the Center has played a key role in initiating a number of other teaching programs with Chinese universities, including:

  • “3+1” undergraduate and “3+2” master’s programs with the Capital University of Economics and Business (CUEB);
  • “4+1” MHRM and MLER programs with Renmin University, as well as a SMLR summer camp program for undergraduate Renmin students; and
  • Executive HR Training and online MHRM programs for Chinese students in partnership with the China Association of Labor Economics (CALE).

Offering Courses at Rutgers

Center Affiliates offer undergraduate and graduate courses that seek to enhance students’ understanding of global dynamics in the contemporary transformation of work and employment. Frequently, courses use a comparative perspective to teach students how unique histories and institutional contexts moderate transnational trends to produce differences in the governance of labor across capitalist democracies. A recently offered PhD seminar on the Comparative Political Economy of Work coincides with the Center’s broader effort to support the research of PhD students and young scholars at Rutgers and across the globe.

Labor & Democracy (Undergraduate) (575:301)

The theory and practice of social movements and social change, particularly those related to work; the prospects for current and future mobilization.

Labor & The Global Economy (Undergraduate) (575:363)

Changes in the global economy and their effects on the living standards and bargaining power of American workers and their unions. Alternative strategies for dealing with globalization.

Economics and Public Policy in a Global Context (Master’s) (578:527)

Economic policy options around the globe; governments and markets; macro- and micro-level approaches; fiscal and monetary policies; competition and social protection: trade; labor; income inequality.

Comparative Political Economy of Work (Doctoral) (545:620)

Theories and contemporary challenges to the governance of work; varieties of institutionalism and institutional change; worker power; gender, immigration, and social investment; human capital and education; the platform economy; the future of work.