Heterodox Economics Newsletter

Issue 261 March 30, 2020 web pdf Heterodox Economics Directory

I assume it does not come as a surprise to you that the current circumstances also affect the discipline of economics. For one, the spread of the corona-virus and its more immediate consequences challenge some existing presumptions about the capacity and potentials of government-led action as well as regarding the relative performance and capabilities of different health care-systems. For another, this crisis also impacts on organizational aspects, including many events and occasions that have been announced in the past issues of this Newsletter. While we have listed recent deadline extensions in our Call for Papers section below, we will supply a list of all events, that have been announced in this Newsletter, but got cancelled or postponed during the last two weeks directly in the following paragraph. By doing so, I hope to provide a concise summary that may be of help for reorganizing your schedule in these hastily changing times.

To our knowledge, the following events have been cancelled or postponed:

For any details, please the consult the respective website or contact the organizers directly.

Stay healthy and all the best,

Jakob

© public domain

Table of contents

Call for Papers

Call for Book Chapter Proposals: Take Back Control. Digital Capitalism and Beyond

Karl Dietz Verlag, publisher of the Marx-Engels-Werke (MEW), is planning a volume with the working title "Take Back Control. Digital Capitalism and Beyond" in its new series "Analyzes". Editors: Timo Daum and Sabine Nuss.

In the 1920s, a wide-ranging debate took place over the feasibility of planning a socialist economic system – what is known in the English-speaking world as the socialist planning debate. The so-called Austrian School around the market liberals von Mises and Hayek argued at the time that a socialist economy could not function at all given its lack of a market mechanism. With the fall of the Soviet Union 30 years ago, the Austrian School was finally able to win a late but clear victory in the conflict between economic systems: "the market," according to prevailing discourse, had triumphed over "the plan." A decisive factor in the victory of capitalism over socialism was the new meta-science of management and control developed after the Second World War: cybernetics. It was concerned with the structure of complex systems – and this did not only refer to biological systems, but also to those of machines, firms and entire societies. With its help, it was thought that blind market processes and crises could be prevented through feedback. Even the political was to be rendered obsolete finally, the state having become superfluous. Today, 70 years after its beginnings, cybernetics is experiencing a renaissance in the hands of digital corporations. With their platforms they have developed digital global ecosystems whose rules they themselves design and control. The analogy to complex natural systems striving for dynamic equilibrium contained in the name is a clear indication of their cybernetic character. Digital capitalism captures and processes every last detail in real time – everything is supposed to become plannable, nothing is to be left to chance. Only today, in a kind of cybernetics 2.0, are its principles actually being realized, with global processes managed using a vast amount of data, instead of only occasionally providing for digitization and automation. In this way, not only does supply find its paying customers ever more precisely and rapidly, but indeed it makes it possible to transcend large-scale production scheduled in advance for an anonymous market. Even notoriously unpredictable user behavior becomes predictable with the help of big data and artificial intelligence, if it has not already been nudged in the right direction from the outset by the right algorithms. Homo oeconomicus has become homo kyberneticus, the feedback-controlled user. The internal work and planning processes of the big firms are changing accordingly, because contrary to the dichotomy of market and plan, planning is also being undertaken in capitalism. Even along the Chinese special road to digital capitalism – at least according to chief capitalist Jack Ma – the goal of realizing the planned economy is within reach. So what about an alternative to this cybernetic capitalism? An alternative in which social production and consumption would no longer be controlled by profit maximization; in which productivity would no longer have to be increased to this end and under the pressure of competition; in which the anonymous market would be replaced by a social arrangement which uses cybernetic management processes in the most resource-friendly and labor-saving manner possible? How does such an alternative differ from the Amazons, the Walmarts, the Googles and the Teslas of our time? And would it face the same fate as its Fordist progenitors, a grandiose failure somewhere between inefficiency and misery? After all, real socialism thoroughly discredited the idea of a planned economy. Only reasonable and resource-efficient in theory, as we all know in reality it often looked like just the opposite: poor working conditions, outmoded technology, no regard for the environment – the fact that capitalists no longer existed did not change a thing. Actually-existing socialism is in retrospect more like the dirty version of industrialism, the ugly little sister or brother of "Americanism" (Antonio Gramsci). Or perhaps the opposition of market vs. plan is fundamentally wrong. Was the socialist planned economy only a "corrective subsystem," a "mutation of capitalism" (Yona Friedman), a "catch-up modernization" (Robert Kurz)? And the attempt to plan a unit of abstract labor doomed to failure from the start?

How to Apply

In the volume we want the debate about planned economy / cybernetics, which is currently experiencing a renaissance in the face of digital technologies to analyze, to be discussed and critically examined with Marx (implicitly or explicitly). The articles should be 25,000 (including spaces). The first version would be submitted on July 1, 2020, and the revised text would be submitted in September. We, Sabine Nuss (publishing manager) and Timo Daum (editor), look forward to hearing from you soon, if possible prior to April 13.

Submission Deadline: 1 July 2020

11th Conference of the Iberian Association of the History of Economic Thought AIHPE (Barcelona, Dec. 2020)

4-5 December 2020 | University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain

The biennial conference of the Iberian Association of the History of Economic Thought (AIHPE) will take place at the School of Economics of the University of Barcelona, Spain, the 4-5 December 2020. Papers on any aspect of the history of economic ideas are welcome, no matter whether within or outside the Iberian geographical framework. Proposals for complete sessions, comprising three or four communications, are particularly encouraged, as well as contributions by PhD students and young scholars. The conference will evoke the legacy of Prof. Ernest Lluch, one of the founders of AIHPE, in the 20 anniversary of his passing.

All interested to present individual papers are invited to submit an abstract of 200 words using the submission form online. Those interested in proposing sessions should send an abstract of 600 words using the submission form online.

Inquiries regarding papers and session proposals should be addressed to Javier San Julian at jsanjulian@ub.edu. Information about registration, accommodation and general program will be soon provided.

Submission Deadline: 15 June 2020

68th Annual Conference of the Japan Society of Political Economy on "Declining Birth Rates and the Contemporary Capitalism" (Hokkaido, Oct. 2020)

24-25 October 2020 | Hokkaido, Japan

The Japan Society of Political Economy celebrated its 60th anniversary last year. The JSPE has endeavored to have wider and deeper perspectives both in theoretical and empirical studies, paying attention to various issues in the real world, from the viewpoint of Marxian economics and other schools of critical political economy. The plenary session at this year’s conference deals with the declining birth rates in the contemporary capitalism. Declining birth rates in advanced capitalist economies have raised many problems regarding the reproduction of our society. Those problems will require us to further investigate the relationship between capital accumulation, employment and labor force, with reference to recent political economy perspectives on gender and family. Presentations and discussions in this conference are expected to greatly contribute to further researches on the economic and social implications of declining birth rate. And this conference will inspire more discussions among various approaches of political economy including Marxian economics, Post-Keynesian economics, institutional and historical schools, the Regulation school, analytical Marxists and so on.

Deadline for the full-paper: The full paper (not exceeding 20 pages of A4 paper, including figures, tables and references) and the extended abstract (one page of A4 paper) in Word format should be submitted by 4 September 2020.

Cost: Attendants have to pay their conference fee (7000 yen per person including the conference dinner), as well as their transportation, accommodation and other personal expenses. We accept your credit card payment with PayPal here. Cash (JPY) only on site.

Notice: There is a possibility that schedule and venue might be modified depending on the situation of Coronavirus infections.

Contact: Prof. Masao Ishikura (Chairman of the JSPE International Committee) E-mail: Jspecice2014 (at) jspe.gr.jp

Submission Procedures and the Deadline: Please complete the form on the website with your proposals.

Submission Deadline: 7 May 2020

Call for Book Chapter Proposals: Unchaining Solidarities

Unchaining Solidarities, (eds.) Petr Kouba, Catherine Malabou, Dan Swain, Petr Urban

The main aim of this edited collection is to explore diverse possibilities for understanding our coexistence with others in terms of solidarity and cooperation. The volume seeks to build on Catherine Malabou's recent focus on the phenomena of solidarity, cooperation and mutual aid, and their place at the intersection of evolutionary biology and politics. While a claim of natural selfishness underpins much contemporary evolutionary biology and the political discourses of neoliberalism and contemporary populism, classical anarchism makes its own claims of naturalness, most notably in Kropotkin's famous identification of mutual aid as a factor of human evolution. Although many might be comforted by the replacement of biologically determined selfishness with biologically determined altruism, such positions are prone to familiar charges of biological essentialism with its natural 'chains' of social cohesion and mutuality. Much subsequent (post-)anarchist thought has resisted this in favour of an emphasis on discursivity. But, as Malabou has emphasised, discourse itself remains bound by its own 'chains': linguistic 'chains', symbolic 'chains', 'chains' of equivalence. Might we then 'unchain' solidarity and mutual aid by locating them at the level of the real? Can we point to a reality of mutual aid free from discursive and biological 'chains', and what kind of social ontology can allow for and grasp this possibility?We especially invite new submissions that aim to reflect on the Covid-19 situation from the perspective of the collection's themes (please see below).

This volume will begin with a new text from Malabou herself, which will frame contributions from other scholars, organized around the following themes:

Researchers are invited to submit a chapter proposal of 300-400 words clearly explaining the mission and concerns of his or her proposed chapter. All proposals should include the author's full name, affiliation (if any) and short biographical note of 100 words maximum and should be submitted at urban@flu.cas.cz. Authors will be notified by April 15, 2020 about the status of their proposals and sent chapter guidelines. Full chapters are expected to be submitted by September 30, 2020.

Submission Deadline: 31 March 2020

Extended Deadline: 18th Conference on the Charles Gide Association (Lausanne, Sept. 2020)

10-12 Semptember 2020 | University of Lausanne, Switzerland

The deadline for submission of proposals for the 18th Conference on the Charles Gide Association from 15 March 2020 has been extended to 5 April 2020. Please find a link to the orginal announcement in the Heterodox Economics Newsletter here.

Extended Deadline: THETS Conference 2020 (Cambridge, Sept. 2020)

2 - 4 September 2020 | Fitzwilliam College, University of Cambridge, UK

The deadline for submission of proposals for the next THETS conference from 15 March 2020 has been extended to 1 April 2020. Please find a link to the orginal announcement in the Heterodox Economics Newsletter here.

Extended Deadline: Understanding Economic Theory and Development in a Sraffian Framework (Hyderabad, Oct. 2020)

19-20 October 2020 | Hyderabad, India

The deadline for submission of proposals for the 18th Conference on Understanding Economic Theory and Development in a Sraffian Framework from 1 March 2020 has been extended to 31 March 2020. Please find a link to the orginal announcement in the Heterodox Economics Newsletter here.

Politica Economica - Journal of Economic Policy (PEJEP): Special Issue on "Acting for Equality"

Five years after PEJEP Special Issue on Gender Budgeting, Politica Economica/Journal of Economic Policy invites submissions of papers for the Special Issue of the Journal of Economic Policy (PEJEP) on “Acting for equality: gender and policy making”. A specific Goal (Goal 5) in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is devoted to achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls. However, the UN Secretary-General (2019) - in analysing the progress in the achievement of Goal 5 - detects the persistence of gender gaps in different dimensions and states that an: “insufficient progress on structural issues at the root of gender inequality, such as legal discrimination, unfair social norms and attitudes, decision-making on sexual and reproductive issues and low levels of political participation, are undermining the ability to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 5.” (UN Secretary-General, 2019, p.11). This gloomy outlook and warning for the global agenda is also reflected in the UNDP Human Development Report (p.148) “..... there are troubling signs of difficulties and reversals on the path towards gender equality—for female heads of state and government and for women’s participation in the labour market, even where there is a buoyant economy and gender parity in access to education. And there are signs of a back-lash.” The UNDP Gender Inequality Index and its components (reproductive health, empowerment and the labour market) show clearly the extent of gender inequalities in crucial dimensions of well-being and with differences across countries. The European Commission (2020, p.2) states the similar fact for Europe as “While the gender gap in education is being closed, gender gaps in employment, pay, care, power and pensions persist.” In its recent Gender Equality Strategy 2020-2025, the Commission sets out policy objectives and actions to progress on gender equality in Europe. To what extent can the observed gender inequalities be connected to the persistent unequal distribution of care responsibilities, with women still performing about three times more unpaid domestic and care work than men or to discriminatory norms and attitudes? To what extent can observed gender inequalities be considered a failure by public government at different level to design and implement effective policies to contrast them? PEJEP 2015 Special Issue on Gender Budgeting, collected and analysed experiences of gender budgeting contrasting gender inequalities at different levels of government and governance and showed how the outcomes differ according to the different institutional support to gender equality objectives (Addabbo, Gunluk-Senesen and O’Hagan). Since 2015 gender budgeting experiences have spread, however: “... gaps remain in country efforts to establish comprehensive and transparent tracking systems. Based on 2018 data from 69 countries, 13 countries fully met the criteria of having in place a tracking system that measures and makes publicly available gender budget data, and 41 countries approached the requirements.” (UN-Secretary General, 2019, p.12).

This special issue of POLITICA ECONOMICA / JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC POLICY confirms the interest of the Journal on gender equality and calls for papers that seek to examine the sources of its persistence, or the policy making processes, and/or specific focus on those policies that are effective in achieving gender equality in different dimensions and their interactions, such as:

Submissions of papers providing specific evaluation of the gender impact of economic and public policies on different dimensions, a critical assessment of economic policy strategies and efforts in engendering decision making are enthusiastically encouraged. All papers submitted should be original research addressing issues related to the theme of the special issue.Papers of no more than 7,000 words (including abstract, keywords and JEL classification codes,
and the additional information “Acting for Equality”) should be submitted via the website.

Submission Deadline: 31 May 2020

Revue de la Régulation: Special Issue on "Dealing with Rent and Rentier Economies: New Challenges for Institutional Economics"

Rent has been a major issue in economics for more than two centuries. Whether classical, Marxist, neoclassical, or the most recent institutionalist approaches, rent as a theoretical concept and empirical object has enjoyed remarkable attention. The contested and unpredictable nature of rent and its impact on economic indicators will continue to make it a popular topic for researchers. This call for papers for the Revue de la régulation seeks to stimulate a renewal of institutional approaches to rent. Contributions of the special issue should address such questions as the following:

The call for papers welcomes analytical and theoretical contributions on rent that draw from or respond to contributions of twentieth-century economists. Similarly, one can consider recent work of economists on the effect of fluctuations in commodity prices in rentier economies following on from the Dutch Disease models (Corden & Neary, 1982, Corden, 1984), analyzes in terms of “commodity traps” or “staples traps” (Hidalgo et al., 2007), or econometric analyses of the “resource curse” or “paradox of plenty” (Sachs & Warner, 2001). Noteworthy, while relying on other methodologies, these standard approaches share some of their conclusions with heterodox analyzes of rent. Have seminal analyzes of rentier economies been extended or overcome by new and significant advances? Is the recent literature on neo-extractivism, which has focused much attention on Latin America (Burchardt & Dietz, 2014), a renewal of the economic analysis of rent? What could be useful institutional frameworks or structural policies directed towards the rentier sectors? In addition to empirical and theoretical analysis, the submissions may also have a more methodological or measurement scope. What methods and tools of analysis would be likely to better account for the dynamics of rent and its impact on national economies?

Submission of Papers

Authors are invited to submit a three-page proposal including at least five major bibliographical references. All correspondence should be addressed to Adrien Faudot (adrien.faudot@univ-grenoble-alpes.fr) and Julien Vercueil (julien.vercueil@inalco.fr).Please follow our instructions and our authors guidelines regarding the submission of a scientific article.

Please find the full call on the website.

Submission Deadline: 1 June 2020

Call for Participants

Summer School on "Modern Monetary Policy and European Macroeconomics" (Maastricht, July 2020)

20-24 July, 2020 | University of Maastricht, Netherlands

Modern Monetary Theory and European Macroeconomics

This course provides an introduction to Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). During the course, students will examine the balance sheets and transactions that are relevant for understanding modern money, with a focus on the Eurozone. Furthermore, alternative explanations are brought forward that include, among others, the idea that governments spend first and collect taxes later. This is the 4th edition of the class, with the last one scoring 9.0/10 in the evaluation of last year.

Goals

Recommended literature: Ehnts, Dirk. 2017. Modern Monetary Theory and European Macroeconomics, Abingdon: Routledge (ISBN hardcover and ebook: 978-1-138-65477-8 and 978-1-315-62303-0)

Link the summer school is available here. Application for the summerschool can be made here.

Application Deadline: 8 June 2020

Summer School on “Theorie und Praxis ökonomischer Politikberatung” (Bochum, September 2020)

7- 9 September, 2020 | Bochum, Germany

Due to growing complexity, policy makers today often seek for scientific advice to guide practical economic policy. Students, in turn, are curious how economic theory from their studies play out in practice. The Chair of Macroeconomics at the Ruhr-University Bochum, the Netzwerk Ökonomische Bildung und Beratung (NÖBB e.V.) and the Chair of Economics of Innovation and Structural Change at the University of Bremen are therefore delighted to announce the second summer school “Theorie und Praxis ökonomischer Politikberatung”. The aim of this summer school is to bridge the gap between economic studies and practice. Participating students will not only be introduced to formats and concepts of economic policy consulting, but also get the opportunity to bring in their views in discussing the topic from an ethical point of view. Additionally, consultants and practitioners from high-ranking institutions will provide insights into the practice of economic policy. The summer school is planned to take place from September 7 th to September 9 th , 2020 at the Ruhr-UniversityBochum. In the case of the current rules on curfews and social distancing with regard to COVID-19 might still be active in September, the summer school is planned to take place online.

How to apply?

The summer school is addressed to graduate and PhD students of economics as well as related social sciences who are interested in economic policy consulting. Please note that the courses of the summer school will be held in German language only. If you are interested in the summer school, we are looking forward to your application containing a CV and a letter of motivation (max. 1.5 pages), in which you state why you wish to attend the summer school. Please send your documents via e-mail. You will be notified about the status of your application until mid of June 2020. For further information, please visit our website.

Application deadline: 17 May 2020

Conference Papers, Reports, and Podcasts

Inside the Economy: A Diversity in Economics Podcast

„In der Wirtschaft (Inside the Economy) – What would you like to drink?

This German speaking podcast dives into one specific economic (research) topic each episode to reveal the surprising diversity in economics. Tune in if you’re interested in a critical discourse, current issues and a casual atmosphere with changing guests. The Podcast is hosted by four friends, studying the MA program "pluralist economics" at the university of siegen. Please find the podcast and more information on the website.

Smith and Marx Walk into a Bar: A History of Economics Podcast

When staying at home listen to podcast is a great way to spend your time and broaden your horizon. For this reason we want to present you the Smith and Marx Walk into a Bar: A History of Economics Podcast.

Episode 26 of 'Smith and Marx walk into a bar: a history of economics podcast': http://hetpodcast.libsyn.com/episode-twenty-six. In this episode, Scott Scheall sits down with Stefan Kolev, Professor of Economics at the University of Applied Sciences Zwickau, to discuss a range of topics, including the history and significance of the German Ordoliberal economists, the "Old" Chicago school of economics, the proper meaning of the term “neoliberalism,” and Stefan’s upbringing in post-communist Bulgaria.

Episode 27 of 'Smith and Marx walk into a bar: a history of economics podcast': http://hetpodcast.libsyn.com/episode-twenty-seven. Carlos attends the 7th Latin American Conference of the History of Economic Thought in Curitiba, Brazil, and talks with Jimena Hurtado of Colombia's Universidad de los Andes, Jose Edwards of Chile's Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, Felipe Almeida of Brazil's Federal University of Paraná, Rebeca Gomez Betancourt of the University of Lyon in France, and Alexandre Mendes Cunha of the Federal University of Minais Gerais about the past, present, and future of the Latin American Society for the History of Economics (ALAHPE).

Episode 28 of 'Smith and Marx walk into a bar: a history of economics podcast': http://hetpodcast.libsyn.com/episode-twenty-eight. Co-hosts Carlos Eduardo Suprinyak, Gerardo Serra, and Scott Scheall discuss a few recent additions to the literature in the history of economic thought. Topics include the disagreement between Adam Smith and Edmund Burke over the East India Company, the evolving conceptualizations of "poverty" in African languages, and the role that policymakers' epistemic limitations may have played in the current "democratic crisis" in many Western democracies.

Episode 29 of 'Smith and Marx walk into a bar: a history of economics podcast': http://hetpodcast.libsyn.com/episode-twenty-nine. Gerardo, Scott, and Carlos talk with philosopher of economics Catherine Herfeld, Assistant Professor of Social Theory and Philosophy of the Social Sciences at the University of Zurich. Topics include Herfeld's work on the various meanings and uses of the rationality principle in economics, the challenges of straddling the disciplines of economics and philosophy, and the pros and cons of different methods of research in the history of economics.

Episode 30 of 'Smith and Marx walk into a bar: a history of economics podcast': https://hetpodcast.libsyn.com/episode-thirty This unique episode features Gary Mongiovi of St. John's University and David Levy of George Mason University discussing their particular perspectives on the work of James Buchanan, winner of the 1986 Nobel Prize in Economics, and father of public choice economics and constitutional political economy.

Job Postings

Leiden University, Netherland

Job title: Assistant Professor of Economics

The position comprises the following tasks:

Selection Criteria

Our Department

In the broad field of applied economics, the activities of the Department of Economics are concentrated on socio-economic policy, law and economics and the economics of taxation. The department provides courses for a number of study programmes, such as law, public administration, liberal arts and political science. Moreover, the department participates in a dual bachelor’s programme (Economics, Governance and Management) and a dual master’s programme (Economics and Governance), both hosted in The Hague.

Terms & conditions

Information

Applications

Applications for this vacancy can be submitted via the blue button of our online system. Please ensure that you upload the following additional documents quoting the vacancy number:

Application Deadline: 1 April 2020

Vienna University of Technology, Austria

Job title: Assistant Professorship - Tenure Track for a Female Researcher

The Faculty of Architecture and Planning at TU WIEN invites applications for an Assistant Professorship -Tenure Track for a Female Researcher in the field of “Social Infrastructure Research and Planning” in form of an initially fixed-term (6 years) tenure track position starting from July 1, 2020. The candidate and TU Wien can agree upon a tenure evaluation, which when positive, opens the possibility to change the position to Associate Professor with an unlimited contract. The tenure-track position is affiliated to the Institute of Spatial Planning. According to TU Wien’ s Plan for Advancement of Women, this announcement invites applications from women only.

Tasks:

Social, economic, demographic and spatial developments are affecting social infrastructures (SI) significantly whilst digitization may rapidly change the planning, provision and governance of services. Given the large variety of social infrastructure, there searcher will deal with at least one of the following fields: education (all levels from childcare to adult education), healthcare, socialservices, and/or (social) housing. While the basic disciplinary background sof there searcher are open (e.g., spatial planning, architecture, social sciences, economics, management, regional sciences, cultural/urban studies), the successful applicant will show a strong foundation (theory and methods) in one of these disciplines, combined with a proven urban/regional and spatial research perspective at an internationally competitive level, and a clear link age to spatial (urban/regional) planning. The appointee is expected to carry out research in the above-mentioned fields at an internationally competitive level, develop her own distinctive research record, teach at graduate and undergraduate levels, supervise bachelor and master theses, and generally contribute to research at the Faculty’s Institute of Spatial Planning. Applicants should possess strong academic credentials, academic leadership capabilities, and proven experience in conducting externally funded research projects. The TU Wien is among the most successful technical universities in Europe, and is Austria's largest scientific and technical research and educational institution. The Faculty of Architecture and Planning, one of the eight faculties at the TU Wien, has an excellent international reputation and plays an active role in national and international research. People with special needs are equally encouraged to apply. In case of any questions, please contact the confidant for disabled persons at the university (contact:gerhard.neustaetter@tuwien.ac.at).

Applicants are expected to have the following essential or desirable qualifications in relation to the above-mentioned fields of research:

Essentials:

Desirables:

Applications should include:

We look forward to receiving your application! The applications (in German or English) should be sent to the Dean of the Faculty of Architecture and Planning, Prof. Rudolf Scheuvens, in digital form (a single pdf file to:socialinfrastructure@tuwien.ac.at). All details are available at our Institute's webseite, and in the official newsletter (register) of our university.

Application Deadline: 16 April 2020

Awards

Call for Nominations: Association for Evolutionary Economics (AFEE) Awards 2021

The Association for Evolutionary Economics (AFEE) Board of Directors is seeking nominations for the following 2021 Awards:

Veblen-Commons Award, James H. Street Latin American Scholar, AFEE Service Award

Please send nominations and supporting materials to John Hall, Chair, AFEE Awards Committee, at johnbattaillehall@gmail.com.

Nomination Deadline: 10 April 2020

Call for Nominations: The Deutscher Memorial Prize

Every year, the Deutscher Prize is awarded for a book which exemplifies the best and most innovative new writing in or about the Marxist tradition. Nominations for this year's prize (covering publication dates from May 2019 through to April 2020) are now open. Anyone can nominate a candidate for the Deutscher Prize. Nominations for each year’s prize. The prize is awarded for a book which exemplifies the best and most innovative new writing in or about the Marxist tradition. To nominate a candidate for this year's prize, please use the online form (if you wish to submit more than one title, simply complete and send the form more than once) or send an email to deutscherprize@gmail.com stating the author, title and publisher of the book, and your reason for nominating it.

Nomination Deadline: 1 May 2020

Journals

The Real-World Economics Review 91

David Colander: Complexity, the evolution of macroeconomic thought, and micro foundations

Asad Zaman: Models and reality: How did models divorced from reality become epistemologically acceptable?

Bernard C. Beaudreau: The value of “thinking like an economist”

Lukas Bäuerle: An essay on the putative knowledge of textbook economics

Theodore P. Lianos: World population: the elephant in the living room

John E. Coulter: The carbon economy – rebuilding the building blocks of economics and science

M. Shahid Alam: Breaking the golden handcuffs: recreating markets for tenured faculty

Gerald Holtham: Reinforcing the Euro with national units of account

Ali Kadri: Neoliberalism vs. China as model for the developing world

John B. Benedetto : Classifying “globally integrated” production firms from a worker/citizen perspective

Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics 91 (1)

Muluneh Hideto Dato, Marek Hudon and Roy Mersland: Board Governance: Does Ownership Matter?

Maleke Fourati and Antonio Estache: Infrastructure Provision, Politics and Religion: Insights from Tunisia's New Democracy

Jasper Grashuis: Returns to Debt and Equity in Farm Producer Organizations

Darwin Cortes, Guido Friebel and Darío Maldanado: Crime and Education in a Model of Information Transmission

Carmen Guzman, Francisco J. Santos and María de la O Barroso: Cooperatie Essence and Entrepreneurial Quality: A Comparative Contextual Analysis

Su Dinh Thanh and Nguyen Phuc Canh: Fiscal Decentralization and Economic Growth of Vietnamese Provinces: The Role of Local Public Governance

Saibal Kar, Biswajit Mandal, Sugata Marjit & Vivekananda Mukherjee: Seeking Rent in the Informal Sector

Annals of the Fondazione Luigi Einaudi: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Economics, History and Political Science 53 (2)

Journal Editors: Introduction to the Symposium on Cliometrics

Stefano Fenoaltea: Spleen: The Failures of the Cliometric School (target article)

Leandro Prados de la Escosura: Pace Baudelaire? Comment on 'Spleen: The Failures of the Cliometric School' by Stefano Fenoaltea

Alberto Baffigi: Stefano’s Face: Comment on 'Spleen: The Failures of the Cliometric School' by Stefano Fenoaltea

Giovanni Vecchi: See You in Valhalla: Comment on 'Spleen: The Failures of the Cliometric School' by Stefano Fenoaltea

Claude Diebolt and Michael J. Haupert: Measuring Success: Clio and the Value of Database Creation

Jacob Assa: Gross Domestic Power: A History of GDP as Numerical Rhetoric

Journal Editors: Introductory Note to the Symposium on Happiness, Well-being and (De)Growth

Andrew E. Clark and Conchita D’Ambrosio: One Size Fits All? Well-being, Measurement and Growth

Leonardo Becchetti: Beyond the Homo Economicus

Pierluigi Conzo: A Comment to the Papers by Clark, D’Ambrosio and Becchetti about Happiness and (De)growth

Maurizio Pugno: Happiness, Human Development and Economic (De)Growth

Emanuele Felice: Broadening the Scope of Economic History: How Happiness Has Changed over the Long Period and its Relationship with Economics

Daniela Donnini Macciò: Against ‘English Happiness’: Pigou’s Ethical Quest and Nietzsche

Anna Carabelli: Keynes’s Aristotelian Eudaimonic Conception of Happiness and the Requirement of Material and Institutional Preconditions: The Scope for Economics and Economic Policy

Scott James and Lucia Quaglia: The UK as a Conflicted Pacesetter in Trading Up Post-crisis International Derivatives Regulation

Roberto Ventresca: Making Neoliberal Narratives of European Integration. The Case of the Institute of Economic Affairs (1970s-1980s)

Carmen Vita: Crisis, Divergence and Monetary Union in the Italian Debate: A Review Essay

Cambridge Journal of Economics 44 (2)

Laurie Bréban and Muriel Gilardone: A missing touch of Adam Smith in Amartya Sen’s account of public reasoning: the man within for the man without

Jens Beckert: Markets from meaning: quality uncertainty and the intersubjective construction of value

Wolfgang J. Fellner and Benedikt Goehmann: Human needs, consumerism and welfare

Kevin Albertson and Paul Stepney: 1979 and all that: a 40-year reassessment of Margaret Thatcher’s legacy on her own terms

Juergen Amann and Paul Middleditch: Revisiting Reinhart and Rogoff after the crisis: a time series perspective

Guglielmo Forges Davanzati and Nicolò Giangrande: Labour market deregulation, taxation and labour productivity in a Marxian–Kaldorian perspective: the case of Italy

Keston K. Perry: Innovation, institutions and development: a critical review and grounded heterodox economic analysis of late-industrialising contexts

Stephen Thompson: Growth, external markets and stock–flow norms: a Luxemburg–Godley model of accumulation

Alfred Kleinknecht: The (negative) impact of supply-side labour market reforms on productivity: an overview of the evidence

Jan Toporowski: Anwar Shaikh and the classical theory of interest: a critical note

Florian Botte: Estimating normal rates of capacity utilisation and their tolerable ranges: a comment on Mark Setterfield

Mark Setterfield: Tolerable ranges of variation in the rate of capacity utilisation and corridor instability: a reply to Florian Botte

Capital and Class 44 (1)

Beltran Roca and Jon Las Heras: Trade unions as retaining walls against political change: A Gramscian approach to remunicipalisation policies in a Spanish City

Kiyoshi Nagatani: Value-form and the mystery of money

Kim Moody: Productivity, crises and imports in the loss of manufacturing jobs

William Jefferies: Piero Sraffa’s physical price system and reproduction without production

David Neilson: Bringing in the ‘neoliberal model of development’

Industrial and Coporate Change 29 (2)

Yasin Ozcan and Shane Greenstein: Technological leadership (de)concentration: causes in information and communication technology equipment

Lene Kromann; Nikolaj Malchow-Møller ; Jan Rose Skaksen and Anders Sørensen: Automation and productivity—a cross-country, cross-industry comparison

Carl Benedikt Frey; Peter Neuhäusler and Knut Blind: Patents and corporate credit risk

Giovanni Dosi; Marco Grazzi; Daniele Moschella ; Gary Pisano and Federico Tamagni: Long-term firm growth: an empirical analysis of US manufacturers 1959–2015

Jatinder S Sidhu; Mariano L M Heyden; Henk W Volberda and Frans A J Van Den Bosch: Experience maketh the mind? Top management teams’ experiential background and cognitive search for adaptive solutions

Sandro Montresor and Antonio Vezzani: Design centrality, design investments and innovation performance: an empirical analysis of European firms

Ching T Liao: Laggards imitate, leaders innovate: the heterogeneous productivity effect of imitation versus innovation

Adeline Pelletier; Susanna Khavul and Saul Estrin: Innovations in emerging markets: the case of mobile money

Italo Colantone; Alessia Matano and Paolo Naticchioni: New imported inputs, wages and worker mobility

Fabrizio Castellucci and Barbara Slavich : Stir it up: how master-apprentice relationships affect the similarity of product offerings in high-end restaurants

Journal of Agrarian Change 20 (2)

Matthew Houser, Diana Stuart: An accelerating treadmill and an overlooked contradiction in industrial agriculture: Climate change and nitrogen fertilizer

Chen Yiyuan: Land outsourcing and labour contracting: Labour management in China's capitalist farms

Shreya Sinha: The politics of markets: Farmer–trader relations under neoliberalism in Punjab, India

Noaman G. Ali: Agrarian class struggle and state formation in post‐colonial Pakistan, 1959–1974: Contingencies of Mazdoor Kisan Raj

Rowan Lubbock: The hidden edifice of (food) sovereignty: Rights, territory, and the struggle for agrarian reform in Venezuela

Horacio Mackinlay: Well‐off small‐scale tobacco growers and farm workers in the Mexican agrarian reform (1972–1990)

Journal of Evolutionary Economics 30 (1)

Lisa Gianmoena: Introduction to the special issue in “Economics, Economic Policies and Sustainable Growth in the Wake of the Crisis”

Giovanni Covi & Ulrich Eydam: End of the sovereign-bank doom loop in the European Union? The Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive

Giovanni Covi & Ulrich Eydam: Correction to: End of the sovereign-bank doom loop in the European Union? The Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive

Laura Carvalho & Corrado Di Guilmi: Technological unemployment and income inequality: a stock-flow consistent agent-based approach

Annarita Colasante, Simone Alfarano, Eva Camacho-Cuena & Mauro Gallegati: Long-run expectations in a learning-to-forecast experiment: a simulation approach

Daniele Tavani & Luca Zamparelli: Growth, income distribution, and the ‘entrepreneurial state’

Alberto Botta: The short- and long-run inconsistency of the expansionary austerity theory: a post-Keynesian/evolutionist critique

Enno Schröder: Offshoring, employment, and aggregate demand

Simone Landini, Mauro Gallegati & J. Barkley Rosser: Consistency and incompleteness in general equilibrium theory

Review of Political Economy 31 (3)

Matteo Deleidi & Mariana Mazzucato: Putting Austerity to Bed: Technical Progress, Aggregate Demand and the Supermultiplier

Anders Fremstad, Luke Petach & Daniele Tavani: Climate Change, Innovation, and Economic Growth: The Contributions of William Nordhaus and Paul Romer

Stefanos Ioannou, Dariusz Wójcik & Gary Dymski: Too-Big-To-Fail: Why Megabanks Have Not Become Smaller Since the Global Financial Crisis?

Giancarlo Bertocco & Andrea Kalajzić: Great Recession and Macroeconomic Theory: A Useless Crisis?

Laurent Cordonnier, Thomas Dallery, Vincent Duwicquet, Jordan Melmies & Franck Van de velde: The (Over)Cost of Capital: Financialization and Nonfinancial Corporations in France (1961–2011)

Joseph Persky: Von Thünen’s Political Economy of Justice

Ramesh Chandra: Nicholas Kaldor on Adam Smith and Allyn Young

Nina Eichacker: Rethinking the Theory of Money, Credit, and Macroeconomics: A Review Essay

Review of Radical Political Economics 52 (1)

Yasemin Dildar: Targeting Women’s Employment: Do Employment Subsidies Work? Evidence from Turkey

Yun K. Kim: Household Debt Accumulation and the Great Recession of the United States: A Comparative Perspective

Francesco Macheda and Roberto Nadalini: The Danger of a “Geyser Disease” Effect: Structural Fragility of the Tourism-Led Recovery in Iceland

Nekeisha Spencer, Mikhail-Ann Urquhart, and Patrice Whitely: Class Discrimination? Evidence from Jamaica: A Racially Homogeneous Labor Market

Hao Qi and David M. Kotz: The Impact of State-Owned Enterprises on China’s Economic Growth

Han Cheng and Minqi Li: Do Labor Values Explain Chinese Prices? Evidence from China’s Input-Output Tables, 1990–2012

Maria N. Ivanova: Marx’s Theory of Money: A Reappraisal in the Light of Unconventional Monetary Policy

Science in Context 32 (4)

Jakob Kapeller, Daniel Meyer: Introduction: change and persistence in contemporary economics

Matthias Aistleitner, Jakob Kapeller, Stefan Steinerberger: Citation patterns in economics and beyond

Florentin Glötzl, Ernest Aigner: Six Dimensions of Concentration in Economics: Evidence from a Large-Scale Data Set

Marcella Corsi, Carlo D’Ippoliti, Giulia Zacchia: On the evolution of the glass ceiling in Italian academia: the case of economics

Tim Winzler : The superiority of economics and the economics of externalism – a sketch

Ulrike Jacob and Oliver A. Brust : Confronting the anomaly: directions in (German) economic research after the crisis

Books and Book Series

Capital in the Nineteenth Century

by Robert E. Gallman and Paul W. Rhode | 2019, University of Chicago Press

When we think about history, we often think about people, events, ideas, and revolutions, but what about the numbers? What do the data tell us about what was, what is, and how things changed over time? Economist Robert E. Gallman (1926–98) gathered extensive data on US capital stock and created a legacy that has, until now, been difficult for researchers to access and appraise in its entirety. Gallman measured American capital stock from a range of perspectives, viewing it as the accumulation of income saved and invested, and as an input into the production process. He used the level and change in the capital stock as proxy measures for long-run economic performance. Analyzing data in this way from the end of the US colonial period to the turn of the twentieth century, Gallman placed our knowledge of the long nineteenth century—the period during which the United States began to experience per capita income growth and became a global economic leader—on a strong empirical foundation. Gallman’s research was painstaking and his analysis meticulous, but he did not publish the material backing to his findings in his lifetime. Here Paul W. Rhode completes this project, giving permanence to a great economist’s insights and craftsmanship. Gallman’s data speak to the role of capital in the economy, which lies at the heart of many of the most pressing issues today.

Please find a link to the book here.

Enacting Community Economies Within a Welfare State

edited by Teppo Eskelinen, Tuuli Hirvilammi & Juhana Venäläinen | 2020, Mayfly Books

The Nordic welfare states, despite their history of successful welfare generation, have recently experienced a penetration of capitalist market relations to ever new spheres of life. Also their failure to create ecologically sustainable welfare models has been undeniable. Simultaneously, community economies have emerged as a source of ideas and practices on what ‘the economy’ fundamentally could signify. In their multiple manifestations, community economies are about enacting the economy differently, on a grassroots level. Yet community economies have typically not been analysed as inspirations and challenges to the future of the welfare state. This is despite that, to some extent, they share the same ethos with Nordic welfare states, based on the values of universalism and decommodification. This book presents a number of empirical case studies of community economies in the context of a Nordic welfare state to better understand the potential of community economies and the interaction and friction with state governance, and more generally the conditions in which community economies and Nordic welfare states can co-exist and cooperate. Could a Nordic welfare state be an enabling platform for community economies to diffuse? And could community economies show the welfare states a future based on decommodification and respect of the ecological limits? The authors of the book are Finnish academics with an activist leaning, representing a number of different academic disciplines.

You can read the book online below, download it for free (and donate a suggested £1 if you like), or purchase a paperback copy at your local bookstore or online.

Making Cars in the New India: Industry, Precarity and Informality

by Tom Barnes | 2018, Cambridge University Press

Auto manufacturing holds the promise of employing many young Indians in relatively well-paid, high-skill employment, but this promise is threatened by the industry's role as a site of immense conflict in recent years. This book asks: how do we explain this conflict? What are the implications of conflict for the ambitious economic development agendas of Indian governments? Based upon extensive field research in India's National Capital Region, this book is the first to focus on labour relations in the Indian auto industry. It proposes the theory that conflict in the auto industry has been driven by twin forces: first, the intersection of global networks of auto manufacturing with regional social structures which have always relied on informal and precariously-employed workers; and, second, the systematic displacement of securely-employed 'regular workers' by waves of precariously-employed 'de facto informal workers'.

Please find a link to the book here.

Planetary Mine: Territories of Extraction under Late Capitalism

by Martin Arboleda | 2020, Verso Books

Planetary Mine rethinks the politics and territoriality of resource extraction, especially as the mining industry becomes reorganized in the form of logistical networks, and East Asian economies emerge as the new pivot of the capitalist world-system. Through an exploration of the ways in which mines in the Atacama Desert of Chile—the driest in the world—have become intermingled with an expanding constellation of megacities, ports, banks, and factories across East Asia, the book rethinks uneven geographical development in the era of supply chain capitalism. Arguing that extraction entails much more than the mere spatiality of mine shafts and pits, Planetary Mine points towards the expanding webs of infrastructure, of labor, of finance, and of struggle, that drive resource-based industries in the twenty-first century.

Please find a link to the book here.

The Lion’s Share: Inequality and the Rise of the Fiscal State in Preindustrial Europe

by Guido Alfani and Matteo Di Tullio | 2019, Cambridge University Press

This is the most in-depth analysis of inequality and social polarization ever attempted for a preindustrial society. Using data from the archives of the Venetian Terraferma, and compared with information available for elsewhere in Europe, Guido Alfani and Matteo Di Tullio demonstrate that the rise of the fiscal-military state served to increase economic inequality in the early modern period. Preindustrial fiscal systems tended to be regressive in nature, and increased post-tax inequality compared to pre-tax - in contrast to what we would assume is the case in contemporary societies. This led to greater and greater disparities in wealth, which were made worse still as taxes were collected almost entirely to fund war and defence rather than social welfare. Though focused on Old Regime Europe, Alfani and Di Tullio's findings speak to contemporary debates about the roots of inequality and social stratification.

Please find a link to the book here.

Heterodox Graduate Programs, Scholarships and Grants

Gran Sasso Science Institute: PhD Programms (Italy)

The Gran Sasso Science Institute (GSSI), based in l’Aquila, Italy, offers post-graduate training to obtain “Philosophiae Doctor” (Ph.D.) degrees in the following fields:

Regional Science and Economic Geography: 7 scholarships

The aim of the PhD in Regional Science and Economic Geography is to address issues related to territorial development,with particular reference to internal and peripheral areas and intermediate cities, focusing on the role of human, cultural and environmental capital in the trajectories of development and growth.The methodological perspective in research and teaching is multidisciplinary in nature, with a combination of approaches relating to the economy of the territory, regional sciences, economic and human geography (including critical and heterodox political economists with socio-spatial research interests of various theoretical strands - geographical political economy broadly understood and more specifically feminist, Marxist, Foucauldian, post-humanist, post-structuralist, neo-institutionalist approaches).

Activities and Duration

The PhD programs last four years.The Academic Year will start on November 1st 2020. Scholarships GSSI awards scholarships until the thesis dissertation and for a maximum of four years. The yearly gross amount of the scholarship is € 16.159,91. Anadditional 50% on a monthlybasis may be awarded for research period abroad if approved by the GSSI.Official language of the PhD Programs:English.

Facilities and benefits

Requirements

English knowledge is compulsory. Applications are open to candidates in possession of one of the following degrees:

Applicants obtaining their degree by no later than October 31, 2020 may apply (both Italian or foreign degree according to the previous description). Applicants will have to send a copy of their degree certificate at phd.secretariat@gssi.it within November 20, 2020(for Italian degrees a “self declaration” can also be accepted).

Application

Applicants must fill out the online application form and attach the required documents. No other application method will be accepted. Data and documents entered into the application form are the sole responsibility of the applicant. In the event of false declarations, the applicant will be excluded from the selection procedure. In order to successfully submit the application form, applicants must insert all the data/information and upload the attachments as listed below. We strongly recommend applicants to review the inserted information and uploaded attachments before submitting the application. No changes are allowed to submitted data. Erroneous data and/or attachments will be evaluated as they are submitted.Please note that applicants are responsible for ensuring that their completed application arrives on time. We strongly suggest that applicants submit their application well in advance of the deadline in order to avoid last-minute congestion in the online application procedure.

Candidates should upload the following documents in pdf format:

Applicants canprovide the names and contact information of up to two referees. The information provided by the applicants in the online form will be used to send the referees an email with a link to a page where they can upload the reference letter: referees should submit reference letters in English or Italian through the online application system. No reference letter uploaded by the candidates will be admitted. For more information, please consult the website or write an email to applications@gssi.it.

Application Deadline: 11 June 2020 (at 5 pm talian time zone)

Calls for Support

Finding the Money: Crowdfunding for an MMT-Documentary

What if the most prominent debate in politics is based on a myth? When any politician proposes a new spending priority, the number one question inevitably asked is: "How will you pay for it? Where will you find the money?" Stephanie Kelton says this is the wrong question to be asking a sovereign government that issues its own currency. And this question prevents real debate about the most urgent crises facing humanity today: the climate crisis, the coronavirus crisis, and an economic crisis. She says, “Finding the Moneyis the easiest part. Kelton embarks on a challenge to turn everything we think we know about money, debt, and taxes upside down.

FINDING THE MONEY captures the historic rise of Modern Monetary Theory, one of the biggest theoretical shifts to hit politics and economics in decades. Kelton states the US federal government is not like a household, it does not borrow money like you or me, and the national debt is not leaving a burden for our children and grandchildren to pay back: in fact it is doing quite the opposite. Her ideas run so counter to mainstream economics, she is not surprised when top tier economists from both sides of the political spectrum berate the theory as “voodoo economics”, “dangerous”, and “just plain wrong”. We need your help to bring this MMT movie to life! All donations are tax-deductiblethanks to our fiscal sponsor, Filmmakers Collaborative Inc. We are raising $15,000 to finish production, and begin editing a short version of the film with the goal for release by September 2020. But if you know anything about MMT, you know that it is a complex story that demands a feature length film. The project will expand into a longer form in 2021 that takes the viewer on a 5,000-year journey through the history of money, while exploring the current conflict and debate around Modern Monetary Theory. Kelton and MMT insist there is a fundamental myth about money lying at the heart of economics. She explains in a country where the government creates the currency, taxes don’t really ‘pay for’ spending. In fact the government must spend dollars into the economy before it can collect any dollars back as tax revenue. According to her, this simple reversal of order changes everything.

How can we pay for expensive new proposals like Medicare for All or a Green New Deal? Kelton states the same way Congress pays for everything: it votes to fund the spending. “You don’t find the money, you have to find the votes.” Instead of asking ‘how will you pay for it?’ we should be asking ‘how will you resource it?’ This debate will affect everything from politics, to pocketbooks, to the health of the planet. And has the potential to shift the deepest partisan divisions in the US. We believe the American people have a right to participate inthis urgent and timely issue.Please contact us if you are interested in getting involved, through your skills, time, or donations. We are seeking a few special partners to get involved through matching grants. The full budget for the short film is $75,000, and we are 60% of the way through production.

If you would like to support the campaign please visite the website or the Gofundme campaign.

For Your Information

Free access to Edward Elgar content to support online teaching and learning

In the wake of Covid-19 related university closings, online and virtual classes have become a key component in the continuity of studies for students and instructors. Edward Elgar Publishing has been developing a library of resources for teaching in the fields we publish and we are pleased to offer free access to pertinent content through our Elgaronline digital platform. We would also like to remind you that no matter what your area of interest, the introductory chapters of most of our publications are available for viewing as well. If we can help in any way to get more Elgar econtent to your users to assist in courses and teaching please let us know. Please find a link to online teaching ressources here as well as a list of free chapters available below: