Foundations of Political Economy
Compilation Document
Contents
Feminist Economics.............................................................................................................................10
beyond class as a category of analysis.............................................................................................10
Household, reproduction and production linkages..........................................................................10
contradictory effects of labour market participation.......................................................................11
economic restructuring and labour market flexibilization...............................................................11
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................12
Intersectionality...................................................................................................................................13
What is intersectionality?................................................................................................................13
using intersectionality as an analytical tool.....................................................................................13
Power plays: the FIFA World Cup.................................................................................................13
The interpersonal domain of power................................................................................................14
the disciplinary domain of power....................................................................................................14
The cultural domain of power.........................................................................................................14
the structural domain of power.......................................................................................................15
social inequality: a new global crisis?..........................................................................................15
Latinidades: the black women’s movement in Brazil...................................................................16
Core ideas of intersectional frameworks.........................................................................................17
Economy and State: a sociological perspective...................................................................................19
Central Institutions of Capitalism.....................................................................................................19
Karl Polanyi and the role of the state in construction of markets................................................20
Development: the state’s role in advancing economic prosperity.......................................................21
Chapter 6.........................................................................................................................................21
Modernization theory..................................................................................................................21
dependency theory......................................................................................................................22
the world-systems perspectives..................................................................................................23
the neoclassical approach to economic development.................................................................23
the comparative institutional approach.......................................................................................24
late industrialization and developmental states..........................................................................25
Ideas and economic development...............................................................................................26
conclusion....................................................................................................................................26
1
,Economy and state as sociological perspective...................................................................................28
Introduction.....................................................................................................................................28
What is economy?.......................................................................................................................28
What is state?..............................................................................................................................28
conceptualizing economy – state relations..................................................................................29
Economics: the user’s guide................................................................................................................33
Chapter 2 – from PIN to PIN............................................................................................................33
All change: how the actors and the institutions of capitalism have changed..............................33
Capitalists are different................................................................................................................34
Markets have changed.................................................................................................................34
Money – the financial system – has also changed.......................................................................34
Concluding remarks.....................................................................................................................35
Chang chart..........................................................................................................................................36
Economics: the User’s Guide...............................................................................................................38
Chapter 9.........................................................................................................................................38
Inequality.....................................................................................................................................38
real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................40
poverty.........................................................................................................................................41
Real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................42
Concluding Remarks: Why Poverty and Inequality Are Not Beyond Human Control.......................43
Economics: the User’s Guide...............................................................................................................44
Chapter 10.......................................................................................................................................44
Work............................................................................................................................................44
Real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................45
unemployment............................................................................................................................46
real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................48
Concluding Remarks: Taking Work Seriously...............................................................................49
Economics: the User’s Guide...............................................................................................................51
Chapter 6.........................................................................................................................................51
Output.........................................................................................................................................51
Real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................52
lncome.........................................................................................................................................52
Real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................53
Happiness....................................................................................................................................54
Concluding Remarks: Why Numbers in Economics Can Never Be Objective...............................55
Leviathan or Philosopher King: The Role of the State..........................................................................56
2
, The state and economics.................................................................................................................56
Political economy: a more honest name?....................................................................................56
The state cannot be above individuals: the contractarian view...................................................56
Nasty, brutish, and short: Thomas hobbes and the original contractarian argument..................56
Modern contractarian/libertarian arfument on the role of the state..........................................56
The contractarian argument exaggerates individuals’ independence from society.....................57
Government failure.........................................................................................................................57
Dictators, politicians, bureaucrats and interest groups: the government/those who control the
government may not even want to promote the greater good...................................................57
The government may not be able to correct for market failures, even if it wants to, due to
asymmetric information and resource constraints......................................................................57
Depoliticization: rid the market of politics...................................................................................58
Market and politics..........................................................................................................................58
Government failures need to be taken seriously, but with a large pinch of salt..........................58
The proposal to depoliticize is anti-democratic...........................................................................58
There isn’t a single scientific way to draw the boundary between market and politics...............58
The white witch and the deeper magic: the ultimate impossibility of depoliticization................58
What governments do.....................................................................................................................59
Real life numbers.............................................................................................................................59
The size of the government, measured by government expenditure as a proportion of GDP, has
grown a lot in the last century and a half....................................................................................59
A lot of government expenditure is transfer, rather than own consumption or investment.......59
The influence of the government cannot be fully captured by numbers.....................................59
Concluding remarks: economics is a political argument..................................................................59
Economics: the User’s Guide...............................................................................................................60
Chapter 7.........................................................................................................................................60
Economic Growth and Economic Development...........................................................................60
Real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................62
Industrialization and Deindustrialization.....................................................................................63
Real life numbers.........................................................................................................................64
Running Out of the Planet?:Taking Environmental Sustainability Seriously................................65
Concluding Remarks: Why We Need to Pay More Attention to Production................................67
Dramatis Personae: Who are the Economic Actors.............................................................................68
Individuals as Heroes and Heroines.................................................................................................68
The individualist vision of the economy.......................................................................................68
The appeal of the individualist vision of the economy and its limits...........................................68
3
, Organizations as the Real Heroes: The Reality of Economic Decision-making.................................68
Corporations, not individuals, are the most important economic decision-makers....................69
Corporate decisions are not made like individual decisions........................................................69
Who are the shareholders?.........................................................................................................69
The separation of ownership and control....................................................................................69
Workers and governments also influence corporate decisions...................................................69
Volkswagen and the complexity of modern corporate decision-making.....................................70
The cooperative as an alternative form of enterprise ownership and management...................70
One-person-one-vote: rules of cooperative decision-making......................................................70
Many workers do not make decisions as individuals any more...................................................71
Some trade unions even play a part in national policy-making...................................................71
The government is the single most important economic actor...................................................71
How the government makes its decisions: compromises, compromises (and lobbying).............72
Those that promote ideas: UN agencies and the ILO...................................................................72
Even individuals are not what they are supposed to be..................................................................72
The dividend individual: individuals have 'multiple selves'..........................................................72
The embedded individual: individuals are formed by their societies...........................................72
The impressionable individual: individuals are deliberately manipulated by others...................73
The complicated individual: individuals are not just selfish.........................................................73
The bumbling individual: individuals are not very rational..........................................................74
Concluding remarks: only imperfect individuals can make real choices..........................................74
Chapter 10 – the comparative political economy of finance and corporate governance....................76
Introduction.....................................................................................................................................76
The comparative political economy of stakeholder and shareholder capitalism.............................76
Building finance capitalism..............................................................................................................77
Global capitalism, internationalizing finance and national financial systems..................................77
The comparative political economy of financialization....................................................................78
What is left of national financial systems? Tracing processes of financial change...........................78
What is social policy?...........................................................................................................................80
hey, big spender!.............................................................................................................................80
Butterflies vs magpies......................................................................................................................80
Who cares?......................................................................................................................................80
A good life........................................................................................................................................81
Summary..........................................................................................................................................82
200 Countries, 200 Years.....................................................................................................................83
Racism at the dawn of the twenty-firs century....................................................................................84
4
Compilation Document
Contents
Feminist Economics.............................................................................................................................10
beyond class as a category of analysis.............................................................................................10
Household, reproduction and production linkages..........................................................................10
contradictory effects of labour market participation.......................................................................11
economic restructuring and labour market flexibilization...............................................................11
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................12
Intersectionality...................................................................................................................................13
What is intersectionality?................................................................................................................13
using intersectionality as an analytical tool.....................................................................................13
Power plays: the FIFA World Cup.................................................................................................13
The interpersonal domain of power................................................................................................14
the disciplinary domain of power....................................................................................................14
The cultural domain of power.........................................................................................................14
the structural domain of power.......................................................................................................15
social inequality: a new global crisis?..........................................................................................15
Latinidades: the black women’s movement in Brazil...................................................................16
Core ideas of intersectional frameworks.........................................................................................17
Economy and State: a sociological perspective...................................................................................19
Central Institutions of Capitalism.....................................................................................................19
Karl Polanyi and the role of the state in construction of markets................................................20
Development: the state’s role in advancing economic prosperity.......................................................21
Chapter 6.........................................................................................................................................21
Modernization theory..................................................................................................................21
dependency theory......................................................................................................................22
the world-systems perspectives..................................................................................................23
the neoclassical approach to economic development.................................................................23
the comparative institutional approach.......................................................................................24
late industrialization and developmental states..........................................................................25
Ideas and economic development...............................................................................................26
conclusion....................................................................................................................................26
1
,Economy and state as sociological perspective...................................................................................28
Introduction.....................................................................................................................................28
What is economy?.......................................................................................................................28
What is state?..............................................................................................................................28
conceptualizing economy – state relations..................................................................................29
Economics: the user’s guide................................................................................................................33
Chapter 2 – from PIN to PIN............................................................................................................33
All change: how the actors and the institutions of capitalism have changed..............................33
Capitalists are different................................................................................................................34
Markets have changed.................................................................................................................34
Money – the financial system – has also changed.......................................................................34
Concluding remarks.....................................................................................................................35
Chang chart..........................................................................................................................................36
Economics: the User’s Guide...............................................................................................................38
Chapter 9.........................................................................................................................................38
Inequality.....................................................................................................................................38
real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................40
poverty.........................................................................................................................................41
Real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................42
Concluding Remarks: Why Poverty and Inequality Are Not Beyond Human Control.......................43
Economics: the User’s Guide...............................................................................................................44
Chapter 10.......................................................................................................................................44
Work............................................................................................................................................44
Real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................45
unemployment............................................................................................................................46
real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................48
Concluding Remarks: Taking Work Seriously...............................................................................49
Economics: the User’s Guide...............................................................................................................51
Chapter 6.........................................................................................................................................51
Output.........................................................................................................................................51
Real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................52
lncome.........................................................................................................................................52
Real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................53
Happiness....................................................................................................................................54
Concluding Remarks: Why Numbers in Economics Can Never Be Objective...............................55
Leviathan or Philosopher King: The Role of the State..........................................................................56
2
, The state and economics.................................................................................................................56
Political economy: a more honest name?....................................................................................56
The state cannot be above individuals: the contractarian view...................................................56
Nasty, brutish, and short: Thomas hobbes and the original contractarian argument..................56
Modern contractarian/libertarian arfument on the role of the state..........................................56
The contractarian argument exaggerates individuals’ independence from society.....................57
Government failure.........................................................................................................................57
Dictators, politicians, bureaucrats and interest groups: the government/those who control the
government may not even want to promote the greater good...................................................57
The government may not be able to correct for market failures, even if it wants to, due to
asymmetric information and resource constraints......................................................................57
Depoliticization: rid the market of politics...................................................................................58
Market and politics..........................................................................................................................58
Government failures need to be taken seriously, but with a large pinch of salt..........................58
The proposal to depoliticize is anti-democratic...........................................................................58
There isn’t a single scientific way to draw the boundary between market and politics...............58
The white witch and the deeper magic: the ultimate impossibility of depoliticization................58
What governments do.....................................................................................................................59
Real life numbers.............................................................................................................................59
The size of the government, measured by government expenditure as a proportion of GDP, has
grown a lot in the last century and a half....................................................................................59
A lot of government expenditure is transfer, rather than own consumption or investment.......59
The influence of the government cannot be fully captured by numbers.....................................59
Concluding remarks: economics is a political argument..................................................................59
Economics: the User’s Guide...............................................................................................................60
Chapter 7.........................................................................................................................................60
Economic Growth and Economic Development...........................................................................60
Real-life numbers.........................................................................................................................62
Industrialization and Deindustrialization.....................................................................................63
Real life numbers.........................................................................................................................64
Running Out of the Planet?:Taking Environmental Sustainability Seriously................................65
Concluding Remarks: Why We Need to Pay More Attention to Production................................67
Dramatis Personae: Who are the Economic Actors.............................................................................68
Individuals as Heroes and Heroines.................................................................................................68
The individualist vision of the economy.......................................................................................68
The appeal of the individualist vision of the economy and its limits...........................................68
3
, Organizations as the Real Heroes: The Reality of Economic Decision-making.................................68
Corporations, not individuals, are the most important economic decision-makers....................69
Corporate decisions are not made like individual decisions........................................................69
Who are the shareholders?.........................................................................................................69
The separation of ownership and control....................................................................................69
Workers and governments also influence corporate decisions...................................................69
Volkswagen and the complexity of modern corporate decision-making.....................................70
The cooperative as an alternative form of enterprise ownership and management...................70
One-person-one-vote: rules of cooperative decision-making......................................................70
Many workers do not make decisions as individuals any more...................................................71
Some trade unions even play a part in national policy-making...................................................71
The government is the single most important economic actor...................................................71
How the government makes its decisions: compromises, compromises (and lobbying).............72
Those that promote ideas: UN agencies and the ILO...................................................................72
Even individuals are not what they are supposed to be..................................................................72
The dividend individual: individuals have 'multiple selves'..........................................................72
The embedded individual: individuals are formed by their societies...........................................72
The impressionable individual: individuals are deliberately manipulated by others...................73
The complicated individual: individuals are not just selfish.........................................................73
The bumbling individual: individuals are not very rational..........................................................74
Concluding remarks: only imperfect individuals can make real choices..........................................74
Chapter 10 – the comparative political economy of finance and corporate governance....................76
Introduction.....................................................................................................................................76
The comparative political economy of stakeholder and shareholder capitalism.............................76
Building finance capitalism..............................................................................................................77
Global capitalism, internationalizing finance and national financial systems..................................77
The comparative political economy of financialization....................................................................78
What is left of national financial systems? Tracing processes of financial change...........................78
What is social policy?...........................................................................................................................80
hey, big spender!.............................................................................................................................80
Butterflies vs magpies......................................................................................................................80
Who cares?......................................................................................................................................80
A good life........................................................................................................................................81
Summary..........................................................................................................................................82
200 Countries, 200 Years.....................................................................................................................83
Racism at the dawn of the twenty-firs century....................................................................................84
4
