Political economy Books

Elites have always ruled wielding inordinate power and wealth, taking decisions that shape life for the rest. In good times the '1%' can hide their privilege, or use growing social mobility and economic prosperity as a justification. When times get...

Classical Economics Today: Essays in Honor of Alessandro Roncaglia is a collection of essays that pays tribute to Alessandro Roncaglia whose research is based on Schumpeter's dictum that good economics must encompass history, economic theory and...

"Emerging Market Economies and Financial Globalization" offers a comparative analysis of the capital account liberalization process and the variety of policy responses generated among a reduced group of Latin American and Asian countries. In particular,...

'Report on the Agrarian Law' (1795) and Other Writings is the first modern English translation of perhaps the greatest work of the Spanish Enlightenment, Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos's Informe de la Ley Agraria (1795, Report on the Agrarian Law). Informe...

'Ricardo's Gauntlet' advances a critique of the mainstream economic case for international free trade. Taking apart the cluster of interconnected and mutually enforcing 'economic fictions' upon which the argument for free trade relies, the book...

Arab Development Denied examines how over the last three decades the Arab world has undergone a process of developmental descent, or de-development. As a result of defeat in wars, the loss of security and sovereignty, and even their own class proclivity,...

Mathew Carey was one of the most popular and influential economic writers of his day, but his work has been largely overlooked by modern writers, who tend to focus on more scholarly writers or on precursors to contemporary classical economics. Carey was...

'Re-balancing China' addresses three key sets of issues in China's political economy. Part One provides an analysis of the profound effect of the global financial crisis upon China's economy, as well as the positive impact of the massive rescue package...

Progressive theorists and activists insist that contemporary capitalism is deeply flawed from a normative point of view. However, most accept the liberal egalitarian thesis that the serious shortcomings of market societies could be overcome with proper...

This comprehensive historical survey of Italian Marxism explores the growth of different forms of Marxist culture in the period from the Paris Commune through the First World War. In it, Favilli provides indispensible insight on the impact of various...

The urban poor and working class now make up the majority of the world's population and this segment is growing dramatically as the global population expands to 10 billion by mid-century. Much of the population growth results from the displacement of...

Since the 1980s, the world's working class has been under continual assault by the forces of neoliberalism and imperialism. In response, new labor movements have emerged across the Global South-from Brazil and South Africa to Indonesia and Pakistan...

In this engaging collection scholars from across disciplines and across the world examine the contradictory nature of the media, revealing it to be democracy's greatest asset and its greatest threat. This volume explores a range of issues related to the...

This is the first comprehensive examination of Leon Trotsky's view on revolutionary organizational principles, and the dynamic interplay of democratic initiative and principled centralism. Mostly in his own words, these writings are grounded in Trotsky's...

This work lays bare corporate actions both domestic and international, under the guise of legal "personhood," and shows how corporations flaunt laws and act as controlling powers beyond the constraints imposed on legal state citizens. Using international...

Despite the renewed interest in the impact of migration upon economic development in general, remarkably few studies have taken up the ways in which the geographic flows of labor impact capital accumulation itself. Capital Accumulation and Migration...

One hundred years ago the idea of 'the economy' didn't exist. Now, improving the economy has come to be seen as perhaps the most important task facing modern societies. Politics and policymaking are conducted in the language of economics and economic...

Brazil has suddenly become a country of interest to the West, playing a critical role in global economic talks at the G20 and WTO, brokering North-South relations through its new international economic geography, and stepping into regional and global...

This book examines the links between major contemporary public sector reforms and neoliberal thinking. The key contribution of the book is to enhance our understanding of contemporary neoliberalism as it plays out in the public administration and to...

Today's economic crisis is capitalism's worst since the Great Depression. Millions have lost their jobs, homes and healthcare while those who work watch their pensions, benefits, and job security decline. As more and more are impacted by the crisis, the...

America Besieged deals with the underlying forces within U.S. society that deeply affect our lives. Showing how we are being misled and harmed by those who profess to have our interests at heart, Michael Parenti writes: "We are indeed a nation besieged,...

This book provides a comprehensive guide to all three volumes of Karl Marx's 'Capital', with advice on further reading and points for further discussion. Recognizing the contemporary relevance of 'Capital' in the midst of the current financial crisis,...

The EU's single currency crisis and the ensuing human costs have led to Europe's biggest disaster since 1945. This book examines each of its stages and the political and social impact, and reveals the longer-term origins of the crisis, particularly the...

Once held up as a 'poster child' for untrammeled capitalist globalisation, the Irish Republic has more recently come to represent a cautionary tale for those tempted to tread the same neoliberal path. The crash in the world economy had especially grave...

The proclamation by the United Nations that 2012 would be the International Year of Co-operatives represents a milestone in the history of the international co-operative movement. It reflects the growth and renewal of co-operatives globally during the...

Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) have come to public attention in recent years in Ireland with the impact of toll roads, the collapse of social-housing projects and their use in the provision of courts buildings, schools, water/waste water treatment...

The war on terror has shaped and defined the first decade of the twenty-first century, yet analyses of Britain's involvement remain limited and fragmentary. This book provides a comprehensive analysis of these developments. It argues that New Labour's...

This is a book which completely overturns existing understandings of the origins and futures of the War on Terror for the purposes of International Relations theory. As the author shows, this is not a war in defence of the integrity of human life against...

Writing the war on terrorism examines the public language of the war on terrorism, and the way that rhetoric has been used to justify the global counter-terrorism offensive as a response to 9/11. It discusses how language has been used to deliberately...

Substantially revised and updated, this fourth edition of The UK financial system presents a comprehensive explanation of the workings of the institutions and markets making up the UK financial system. It also presents some key theoretical developments...

This title examines how the economic power of Britain and the US limits the opportunities for small states to develop. The work follows the history of the Atlantic economy since the 16th century and shows how Ireland's repeated attempts to industrialize...

How may we compare income distributions? What is poverty and how much of it is there? What are the characteristics of a "good" income tax and what constitutes an "improvement" in an income tax? Broadly speaking, who gets what, and more importantly who...

This book explores the psychic, cultural and political ramifications of memory within the Irish Troubles. It investigates the traumatic impact of the violence perpetrated since 1969; the antagonistic cultural narratives of memory fashioned and mobilised...

The Political Economy of New Labour provides one of the first systematic assessments and accessible evaluations of the modernization of the British Labour Party in the light of its landslide electoral victory in 1997. It also represents a rare attempt to...

Interrogates this ascending political and economic paradigm This landmark work is the first sustained critique of Latin American neostructuralism, the prevailing narrative that has sought to replace "market fundamentalism" and humanize the "savage...

Conflicts over water are human-caused events with socio-political and economic causes. From the Movement of People Against Dams in Brazil to environmental activists in Pittsburgh, people are coming together to fight for control of their water. This book...

An inspiring manifesto offering a radical vision for our political future.We live in an age of crisis and decline. The right presents 'solutions' that only worsen the situation, driving a downward cycle in which desperation leads to despair. But the left...

False profits of ethical capital is a thought-provoking approach to understanding stakeholder capitalism. Rather than focusing on the inadequacies of corporate responsibility, sustainable investment and consumer politics, this book grapples with the...

Why do multinational mining corporations use participation to undermine resistance? Do the struggles of local communities, activists and NGOs matter on a global scale? Why are there so many different global standards in mining? This book develops a new...

The transnationally coordinated response to "Covid-19" witnessed numerous developments reminiscent of the prewar years of the Third Reich, including the suspension of constitutional rights and freedoms, the rollout of draconian legislation, an attempted...

A novel perspective on monetary and fiscal policy that views money as the equity capital of a nationA conventional economic theory, monetarism, holds that inflation is a monetary phenomenon driven by changes in the supply of money. Yet recent experience...

This book looks at the history of work and the meanings that are attached to it over time. Taking as its basis a number of international surveys and interviews conducted in Europe, the authors consider. The significance of work for Europeans today.Over...

Was the Soviet Union a superpower? Red Globalization is a significant rereading of the Cold War as an economic struggle shaped by the global economy. Oscar Sanchez-Sibony challenges the idea that the Soviet Union represented a parallel socio-economic...

In The Depths of Russia, Yale anthropologist and historian Douglas Rogers tells the history of Russian oil from the perspective of the Perm region of the Urals. From the discovery of world's first socialist oil in 1929 to the oil-fueled social and...

As a research field, social movement and political project, degrowth is a multi-faceted phenomenon. It brings together a range of practices including alternative forms of living and initiatives of various kinds in civil society, business and the state...

The book explores the effect of modern technological shifts on human society, showing that technologies are undergoing accelerating qualitative changes that open up new opportunities for personal development and satisfaction of wants and, simultaneously,...