The New School Economic Review

Value Chains: The New Economic Imperialism, by Intan Suwandi

Alexandria Eisenbarth — 2021-12-02

In Value Chains: The New Economic Imperialism, Intan Suwandi exposes market-based economic development strategies as core-centered efforts to maintain monopoly power, derived from the legacy of colonialism. Suwandi, Assistant Professor of Sociology at Illinois State University and frequent contributor to the Monthly Review, makes the case that imperialism remains a relevant concept and that global supply chains are the contemporary site of expropriation from the periphery (roughly, Global South) to the core (roughly, Global North). Suwandi introduces a labor-value commodity chain approach which improves upon “the weaknesses of the GCC/GVC 1 frameworks and the world-systems approach”, by bringing together the organizational strengths of GCC/GVC analysis and the global capital-labor analysis of World Systems analysis.

The Inequality Crisis, edited by Edward Fullbrook and Jamie Morgan

Joshua Greenstein — 2021-11-19

Among the central questions of The Inequality Crisis, a collection of essays published by the World Economics Association, is why inequality was relatively ignored for so long by economists, and the extent to which economics in its current form is equipped to explain inequality now. In his introduction to The Inequality Crisis, Edward Fullbrook discusses the inability of the economics profession to focus on the societal and ecological outcomes of the economic system, which include economic inequality. Fullbrook discusses his hope that this collection of essays will offer a partial corrective to these blind spots of economics, and perhaps some potential paths forward.

Shooting for Unity in the Era of Chaos: A Review of Mission Economy by Mariana Mazzucato

Jose Pedro Bastos Neves — 2021-11-19

As multiple crises of unprecedented gravity loom, the immobility or incapacity of both the private sector and leading governments has become apparent. Keynes’ remarks on the Great Depression are still applicable in our days: “decadent international but individualistic capitalism. . . is not a success. . . But when we wonder what to put in its place, we are extremely perplexed” (Keynes 1933: 760-1). In "Mission Economy: A Moonshot Guide to Changing Capitalism," the expert on industrial policy Mariana Mazzucato helps alleviate this perplexity. Her solution is to abandon free market worship as well as conservative forms of public management in favor of bold risk-taking and innovative co-operation between markets and the public sector.

The Limits of the Wage-led Growth Strategy and the Iron Law of Capitalism: A Theoretical Appraisal

Yaku Fernandez Landa — 2022-10-20

The purpose of this paper is twofold. It identifies the recent development of a profound critique of Kaleckian models of growth and distribution that enables the possibility of endogenous regimes. I also present and discuss a theoretical model in which the IS curve is non-linear and demand regimes are unstable. Different theoretical and policy approaches can be fitted in this model, although it is recognized that under the capitalist system, a sort of iron law arises. Thus, it is not possible to permanently pursue the so-called wage-led growth strategy since the regime changes according to the distribution of income.

Ten Riots That Challenged Injustice and Changed U.S. History

Mike Isaacson — 2020-09-10

There has been a lot of discussion on social media denouncing the property destruction and looting that happened after the very public string of murders and shootings of black folks by police in 2020. Most comments have centered on the lack of productivity of riots in obtaining justice. For the most part, the argumentation goes something like, “destroying your own community will do nothing to bring justice or positive change.” Yet if history is any precedent, these arguments are entirely unjustified. The United States has a long history of riots bringing change that no amount of kumbaya hand-holding or “working within the system” was ever able to accomplish.