by Vinícius Rodrigues Vieira* The literature on populism in the 21st century often assumes that far-right leaders draw their support from voters who have lost out to globalization. This is the case among low-skilled, white workers in Global North democracies, including the United States. But, there are also meaningful occurrences of backlash against the political establishment and […]
Community members posts
by Till Hilmar* My recent book Deserved reconstructs people’s experiences with, and memories of, disruptive economic change. It foregrounds the voices of individuals who endured the “shock therapy” of the 1990s – the transition from communism to market society – in two societies.The analysis is driven by a historical-comparative argument: Before 1989, East Germany and […]
by Asaf Darr* The ongoing and fierce conflict between Jews and Palestinian Arabs is a daily reality in Israel, the country where I reside. As a sociologist of work and economic sociologist, I became increasingly interested in the ways in which the broader conflict is manifested in daily socio-economic encounters on the shop floor between […]
by Dror Goldberg* Where and when did modern currency originate? My book Easy Money: American Puritans and the Invention of Modern Currency (University of Chicago Press, 2023) tackles this fascinating question. I discover and explain the origin of modern currency in 1690 in the English colony of Massachusetts Bay — an unimportant place, compared to […]
by Frank Jacob* What is Immanuel Wallerstein’s legacy for the 21st century? Following the closure of the Fernand Braudel Center for the Study of Economies, Historical Systems, and Civilizations that Wallerstein directed at SUNY Binghampton and the discontinuation in 2016 of Review, the journal he founded in 1976, this is an important question. World-systems theory […]
by Aaron Major* I was first introduced to Richard Lachmann’s work as a graduate student and then had the privilege of calling him a colleague when I joined the faculty at the University at Albany in 2008. His sudden passing two years ago, on 19th September 2021, was a great personal loss to me and […]
by Jean-Louis Laville* Two major lessons emerge from the 19th and 20th centuries. Firstly, the promotion of a market society underpinned by a concern for individual freedom has increased inequality; secondly, the subjugation of the economy to political will under the pretext of equality has led to the suppression of freedoms. These two solutions have […]
by Jongchul Kim* In a given era, social scientists often share a common philosophical perspective, whether overtly or implicitly, despite studying different subjects. So what if the prevailing perspective among mainstream economists proves problematic, preventing them from providing a comprehensive understanding of the capitalist financial system?In modern Western philosophy, conventional economics is built upon two […]
by Ben Clift* Political economy has long taken a keen interest in the politics of economic ideas, but considerably less attention has been paid to the politics of economic method. Method gets neglected as the technical realm within which, it is assumed economic ideas, once established, are implemented in straightforward fashion. In fact, economic method […]
by Oleksandr Svitych* We are living in the times of the populist nationalist challenge to the liberal order. This challenge comes in many forms, including reactionary and progressive ones – from Marine Le Pen’s Front National in France to Jobbik in Hungary, to Manuel López Obrador’s MORENA in Mexico and Pauline Hanson’s One Nation in […]