Heterodox Economics Newsletter
News letter 78
From the Editor
I received the following e-mail from an Italian colleague:
…in my university a new system of research evaluation is going to be approved.
There is the risk that heterodox reviews will probably be undervalued. I remember
that some time ago you mailed an e-mail about a sort of ranking of heterodox
review and publications. Do you have any idea of that? Do you know if it is
possible to find somewhere a sort of ranking among heterodox publications? The
idea is to fight to insert some heterodox reviews in Group A and in Group B.
This clearly raises the question of how heterodox economics in general and specifically
our European colleagues should address the issue of assessing research in a non-pluralist
mainstream environment. As noted in the previous Newsletter, Wolfram Elsner and I are
planning a Workshop on this topic to take place at the University of Bremen, Germany,
in June—particulars of the Workshop are given below. We are also planning propose a
session for the Research Network Macroeconomics and Macroeconomic Policies
(FMM) conference which takes place in Berlin in 30 – 31 October 2009, and a session
for the EAEPE Conference which takes place in Amsterdam, The Netherlands in
November. If you are interested in participating in the Workshop and in one or both of
the proposed conference sessions, contact Wolfram (welsner@uni-bremen.de) or myself
(leefs@umkc.edu).
This year I'm not one of the organisers of the conference of the
research network macroeconomics and macroeconomic policy end of october
in Berlin. Nevertheless, I would like to encourage you to submit a
proposal for a session on ranking methodologies and heterodox
economics.
This topic would fit very well into the conference. Maybe some of the
participants of the Bremen conference in June might be interested to
join such a session.
Fred Lee
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Call for Papers
Assessing Heterodox Economics in a European Context – A Workshop
You are invited to submit a paper for a Workshop on
Assessing Economic Research in a European Context: the future of Heterodox economics and
its research in a non-pluralist mainstream environment
26-27 June 2009, University of Bremen, Germany
Click here for detailed information.
EAEPE Conference 2009: Call for Papers
Institutional Solutions for Economic Recovery
http://eaepe.org/eaepe-conference-2008
The world economy has reached a state of crisis and economists are called to the test. As
governments in the western world have been completely taken by surprise by the credit
crunch, the call upon economists for their knowledge and policy advice has been stronger
than ever before. Economists have responded in political circles and in the media with
standard answers to extraordinary circumstances.
One of the most challenging themes for institutional economists and social scientists is to
explain the economic situation of today and to offer solutions for economic recovery. In
the 20th century institutional economists have been at the forefront in describing and
explaining business cycles and growth. In the 21st century the present generations will
need to revisit some of this legacy and confront this with newer observations. For the
time being many questions abound:
What changes in the institutional environment, the institutional arrangements, and in the
norms and customs of people will lead to economic growth? What is the role of
investments in knowledge, innovations, and entrepreneurship in creating these
institutional improvements? Which improvements in the financial institutions can
contribute to an economic recovery? What has been the impact of an increasing European
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integration and globalization on the severity of the crisis? What is the role of an
international cooperation in the economic recovery
The 2009 Conference of EAEPE in Amsterdam will address, in a broad sense, such
questions and will contribute to the debate on economic recovery, through a
multidisciplinary, institutional and evolutionary perspective.
Keywords: economic recovery, institutional change, globalization
Submission of abstracts:
Upload a 600-700 word abstract through the EAEPE website by May 1, 2009.
The abstract should clearly mention:
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
title of the paper
name of the author(s) and full address of the corresponding author (postal address,
phone, fax and email)
the aim of the study and methodology
(expected) results and/or conclusion
up to 5 keywords.
The submitted abstracts will be refereed by the scientific committee.
Important deadlines:
Deadline for abstract submission: May 1, 2009
Notification for abstract acceptance: May 30, 2009
Deadline for paper submission: September 20, 2009
In order to be included in the final program, the paper has to be submitted before the
above stated date and at least one of the authors has to be registered, has paid the
conference fee and be a paid EAEPE member. Please note that you have to be an EAEPE
member in order to attend the conference.
http://eaepe.org/eaepe-conference-2008
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Association for Evolutionary Economics (AFEE)
Call for Papers
Annual Meeting, Atlanta, Georgia, USA, January 3-5, 2010
Neoliberalism, Markets, and Freedom
AFEE invites proposals for individual papers and complete panels on the theme of
Neoliberalism, Markets, and Freedom. Since the rise of Ronald Reagan and Margaret
Thatcher, the world has undergone a “natural” experiment concerning the proposition that
free markets are necessary, maybe even sufficient, for individual freedom. The theme of
the 2010 annual meetings will be to reassess this proposition. All proposals reflecting
the tradition and analytical perspective of the Association for Evolutionary Economics
will be given serious consideration, but some preference will be given to proposals that
address the following questions:
1. Historically, institutional economists have rejected the conventional discourse that
contrasts “regulated” with “deregulated” markets. By contrast, John Commons
and others have long argued that all markets are regulated. What has been right or
wrong with our management of markets (including financial markets) over the
past thirty years? How might things be improved?
2. “Conventional wisdom,” despite the recent financial crisis, still largely accepts the
long-standing contention of professors Milton Friedman and Friedrich von Hayek
that free markets are essential to freedom. Do “free markets” promote “life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness”? Additionally, what are the concrete
historical and policy implications of the proposition that free markets are the most
reliable way to end or at least mitigate the ugly legacies of discrimination?
3. How have neoliberal economic policies helped or hindered the achievement of
widely accepted social goals such as sustained and sustainable growth, economic
stability, reduced poverty, or a fairer distribution of income? What changes or
modifications in the structure or scope of markets might improve results?
The deadline for submission of proposals for papers and sessions is April 10, 2009.
Submissions via e-mail are strongly encouraged. When sending your email, clearly
identify it as an AFEE paper or panel submission in the subject line. If receipt of your
paper or panel proposal has not been acknowledged within two weeks of submission,
please contact the Program Chair. Authors will be informed whether their proposals have
been accepted by May 19, 2009.
Proposals for panels may contain up to five papers, and must include relevant details of
all papers to be presented (see below). Constraints imposed by the Allied Social Science
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Association severely limit the number of sessions allocated to AFEE. AFEE and the
Program Chair each deeply regret that it will be necessary to turn down a number of
proposals.
Presentations should be no more than eighteen minutes in length so as to leave time for
discussion. To be considered for publication in the June 2010 Journal of Economic
Issues, the text of your paper cannot exceed 2,850 words, plus up to four pages total of
references, tables and figures. The deadline for submission for the June JEI is December
11, 2009. JEI submission details will be provided to authors whose proposals are
accepted for the conference. All criteria for the submission of papers, including
deadlines, will be strictly enforced by the editor.
At least one of the authors of any paper must be a member of AFEE. Contact
afee@bucknell.edu for membership information.
Proposals for papers or panels must be submitted to the Program Chair by April 10, 2009.
The following information must be submitted for each paper:
a)
b)
c)
d)
e)
f)
g)
Name(s) of author(s)
Professional affiliation(s)
Email address of corresponding author
Mailing address of corresponding author
Title of proposed paper
Abstract of no more than 250 words
Your willingness to serve as a discussant or session chair (specify field)
I look forward to hearing from you.
Program Chair: Robert E. Prasch
Department of Economics
Warner Science Hall
Middlebury College
Middlebury, VT. 05753
E-mail: rprasch@middlebury.edu
Phone: 802-443-3419
CALL FOR PAPERS
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The Research Network Macroeconomics and Macroeconomic Policies (FMM)
organises its 13th conference on
‘The World Economy in Crisis – The Return of Keynesianism?’
30 – 31 October 2009, in Berlin.
The submission of papers in the following areas is encouraged:
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Global imbalances and the current crisis
Financial crisis, real crisis and the risks of depression and deflation
Paradigm shift in macroeconomics – the return of Keynesianism?
Economic policy reactions and the future relationship between the market and the
state
Regulation of the financial sector from a Keynesian perspective
Perspectives for a Keynesian New Deal
For the open part of the conference the submission of papers on the general subject of
the Research Network is encouraged as well. We also ask for the submission of papers
for graduate student sessions, on the specific subject of this conference or on the
general subject of the Research Network.
Conference language is English. Selected papers will be published after the conference.
The deadline for paper proposals is 30 June 2009. Please send an abstract (one page) to
Susanne Stöger (susanne-stoeger@boeckler.de). Decisions will be made by mid-August.
Accepted papers should be sent in by 15 October to be posted on the conference web
page.
Please forward this call for papers to your mailing lists.
Organising Committee of the conference:
Sebastian Dullien (dullien@fhtw-berlin.de), Eckhard Hein (eckhard-hein@boeckler.de),
Peter Spahn (spahn@uni-hohenheim.de), Achim Truger (achim-truger@boeckler.de), and
Till van Treeck (till-van-treeck@boeckler.de)
Coordinating Committee of the Research Network:
Sebastian Dullien (FHTW Berlin), Trevor Evans (Berlin School of Economics), Jochen
Hartwig (KOF/ETH Zürich), Eckhard Hein (IMK, Düsseldorf), Hansjörg Herr (Berlin
School of Economics), Torsten Niechoj (IMK, Düsseldorf), Jan Priewe (FHTW Berlin),
Peter Spahn (University of Hohenheim), Engelbert Stockhammer (WU Wien), Claus
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Thomasberger (FHTW Berlin), Achim Truger (IMK, Düsseldorf), and Till van Treeck
(IMK, Düsseldorf)
More on the Research Network: http://www.boeckler.de/91434_36330.html
Call for Papers
Cardiff Business School is organising a small conference of about 40 participants on:
“Political Economy, Financialization and Discourse Theory”
Conference to be held at Cardiff University 28-29 May 2009, from noon on the 28th to
mid- afternoon on the 29th.
The current financial crisis has called into question broader contemporary developments
in the financial and economic sphere. These include an explosion in derivatives trading,
use of off-shore financial centres, and the
`financializing' extension of financial products and financial calculations into new
spheres of economic activity. Now the financial meltdown has arguably dislocated the
project of neo-liberalism.
How, then, is the contemporary phase of capitalist development and associated crisis of
financialization to be conceptualized? What relevance might various forms of discourse
theory have for analysing aspects of this
crisis? This workshop is intended to address the following questions:
•
What is the contribution of discursive/poststructuralist analysis to the interrogation
of central elements of the financial crisis?
•
How do other traditions and forms of analysis serve to highlight the shortcomings
and/or correct the limitations of discursive/poststructuralist analysis?
These questions are pertinent as discursive/poststructuralist analysis has become
increasingly influential in recent years, yet studies of practices central to the development
and reproduction of the contemporary economic and
financial order are exceptional (e.g. de Goede, 2003; Stäheli, 2007). This omission leaves
discursive/poststructuralist analysis vulnerable to the criticism that it fails to adequately
account for the so-called materialist dimensions of social and economic reality (Laffey,
2004). Are such criticisms justified? What discourse theoretic resources might be
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mobilised to neutralise or address such critiques?
The aim of this workshop is therefore to explore and assess the insights into the political
economy of financialization – its confident expansion and possible exhaustion - from a
range of perspectives (e.g. structuralist, critical realist and poststructuralist), paying
particular attention to the contribution of forms of discourse theory to its analysis (Glynos
and Howarth, 2007). More specifically, it is hoped to stimulate and advance
consideration of the potential of discursive analysis for reconstructing the entrenched but
increasingly contested materialist/idealist dichotomy.
The broad intent of the conference is to bring together people with an interest in assessing
and critiquing the contribution that discourse theory can make to the analysis of political
economy and, more specifically, to processes of financialization and the current financial
crisis. We are particularly interested in contributions that address the relevance of
discourse theory and analysis that are either directly informed by, or engage critically
with, poststructuralist thinking.
Professor Marieke de Goede (University of Amsterdam) will give the opening plenary
lecture.
Positive responses to an initial call for papers have so far been received from Glyn Daly,
Melissa Fisher, Paul DuGay, Nick Hildyard, Paul Langley, Anastasia Nesvetailova,
Michael Pryke, Christoph Scherrer, Ewen Speed, Urs Staeheli,
Nigel Thrift, Colin Wight, and Karel Williams.
The fee for the workshop is £75. There is a reduced fee of £50 for PhD students. This
includes lunches, teas and coffees.
Papers are invited that provide some illumination of the issues and questions outlined
above. Please submit an abstract of 300-500 words before February 28th 2009 to Angela
Cox – email coxar@cardiff.ac.uk. Places are strictly
limited and, if necessary, a waiting list will be created.
Hugh Willmott
Casper Hoedemaekers
Robin Klimecki
Angela Cox (Administrator)
Call For Papers – Special Issue of Deleuze Studies on “Deleuze and
Marx”
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Writings on Deleuze and Guattari’s twin volumes, Capitalism and
Schizophrenia, have often focused on questions about desire, body
without organs, the schizophrenic etc. There have been a few notable
exceptions that have attempted to articulate and expound upon the
numerous political problems that Deleuze and Guattari attempt to
resolve through analyses of concepts such as de-/re-territorialization,
coding and re-coding etc, however a specter is haunting Deleuze and
Guattari that has yet to be explained, articulated and debated; the
specter of Karl Marx. This volume attempts to analyze the relationship
between Deleuze (and Guattari) and Marx and their respective works.
This volume is an intervention into the fields of Deleuze Studies,
Marxist and Marxian philosophy and political economy, and critiques of
capitalism through an examination of the relationship between Deleuze
and Marx. This volume will be of interest to people interested in
Deleuze Studies who are interested in questions of politics and
critiques of capitalism, Marxist theory and philosophy and people
interested in political economy.
Themes that will be covered in this volume include (but are not limited
to):
1) hegemony and theories of imperialism
2) the role of philosophy in changing the world,
3) theories of surplus
4) tensions between the virtual and the potential
5) ideology and noology
6) modes of production
7) the nature of anti-capitalist politics in Deleuze’s work.
Please limit the length of papers to no more than 10 000 words. The
deadline for submission of papers is March 30, 2009.
Please include your name, e-mail address, and phone number. Papers
should be e-mailed to dhruv@yorku.edu. All papers will undergo a
double-blind review.
INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE OF POLITICAL ECONOMY: ADAM
SMITH TODAY in Kocaeli - Çanakkale,Turkey from 01. October 2009 to 04. October
2009 Deadline for paper submissions: 15. June 2009
We start our first annual international political economy conference with a conference
on Adam Smith. We start our conference series with Smith because he is regarded as
the founder modern political economy. With his classical work An Inquiry into the
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Nature and causes of the Wealth of Nations he established an internationally
recognized major discipline in 18th century. Today there is hardly any university
throughout the world, which does not have an economy department. However, there is
also a particular reason why we start the series of our conferences with Smith. His
other classical work The Theory of Moral Sentiments was published 250 years ago.
With our first conference we aim to commemorate also the 250th anniversary of the
publication of this classical work in ethical theory. The Theory of Moral Sentiments is
Smith's first work. It served along with his various Essays on Philosophical Subjects
the philosophical foundation of his later works as his Lectures on Jurisprudence clearly
shows.
We start our series of annual international political economy conferences with a
conference on Adam Smith. We start with Smith because he is regarded as the founder
of modern political economy. With his classical work An Inquiry into the Nature and
Causes of the Wealth of Nations he established an internationally recognized major
discipline in 18th century. Today, there is hardly any university throughout the world,
which does not have an economy department.
One other reason for starting with Smith is the 250th anniversary of the publication of
his classical work The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759). The anniversary is being
celebrated with various events throughout the world. The Theory of Moral Sentiments
is Smith's first work which, along with his Essays on Philosophical Subjects, served as
the philosophical foundation for his later works.
The conference aims to explore various aspects of Smith's work, in particular the
relationship between his two major works and what these works mean for our time.
Papers to be presented at the conference may relate to following areas:
 The
impact of his two works, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the
Wealth of Nations and The Theory of Moral Sentiments on today’s local and
global economic issues;
 Intellectual
sources, context and legacy of Adam Smith;
 The typology of
ethics in The Theory of Moral Sentiments;
 Adam
Smith's philosophical work and political economy;
 Adam
Smith and international relations;
 Adam
Smith and his relation with other classical political economists;
 The relevance of
The Wealth of Nations for contemporary issues;
 The
foundation of a lasting economy based on the philosophy of Adam Smith,
ethical and political issues;
 Global
financial crisis and challenges to political economy in terms of the
philosophy of Adam Smith, its relevance for global economy and developing
countries.
These are some of the topics we would like to explore relevant to Adam Smith. Topics
related to any aspects of Smith’s works, relationship between them, their meaning for
our time, their significance for the following philosophers and political economists and
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other topics within the context of political economy should enrich the conference and
expand the given framework for discussion. The language of the conference will be
both Turkish and English.
The papers presented at the Conference will be published in English and Turkish in
Adam Smith Review and Turkish Journal of Political Economy: "Ekonomi Politik".
Session suggestions and abstracts could send to info@asconit.org with writer(s)’ cv by
15th of June 2009.
Further information at: http://www.asconit.org
Please notice that the dead-line for abstracts for the EAEPE Symposium 2009 “Knowledge, firm
behavior and strategic management” to be held in Lappeenranta University of Technology,
Finland (22-23th of May) is 15th of March. Please find more information here:
http://eaepe.org/node/4397
6TH EUROFRAME CONFERENCE
ON ECONOMIC POLICY ISSUES IN THE EUROPEAN UNION
Causes and consequences of the current financial crisis:
what lessons for European Union countries?
Friday, 12 June 2009, London
CALL FOR PAPERS
The EUROFRAME group of research institutes (CASE, CPB, DIW, ESRI, ETLA, IfW,
NIESR,OFCE, PROMETEIA, WIFO) will hold its sixth annual Conference on Economic
Policy Issues in the European Union in London on 12 June 2009. The aim of the
conference is to provide an economic forum for debate on economic policy issues
relevant in the European context.
The Conference will focus on causes and consequences of the current financial
crisis with a view to draw lessons for EU countries. Contributions should address
issues related to: Causes of the current financial crisis (search for high profitability,
growth based on indebtedness and capital gains, functioning of global finance: banks’
behaviour, derivative products, financial bubbles, failure of financial mathematics;
failures in the national and international regulatoryframeworks); Financial crises and
the real economy, analysing consequences and solutions to the problems they have
caused (evidence for the links between financial crises and consumption behaviour; links
between banks, equity markets and firms in financial crises; what can we learn from
previous advanced economy financial crises); The development of the current crisis
and policy answers (vicious circles in banking, financial and equity markets, failures
and successes ofgovernment measures to restore the functioning of the financial and
banking systems). Towards a new Financial System? (Less finance or finance without
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bubbles?, World growth without imbalances?, New banking and financial regulations?, A
new European regulatory framework? A new global financial architecture? A new
functioning of financial markets?).
Submission Procedure
Abstracts should be submitted by e-mail before 13 March to
catherine.mathieu@ofce.sciencespo.fr. Abstracts (2 pages) should mention: title of
communication, name(s) of the author(s), affiliation, corresponding author’s e-mail
address, postal address, telephone number.
Corresponding authors will be informed of the decision of the scientific committee by
mid-April.
Full papers should be received by e-mail by 25 May.
Scientific Committee
Karl Aiginger (WIFO), Ray Barrell (NIESR), Michiel Bijlsma (CPB), Marek Dabrowski
(CASE),
Christian Dreger (DIW), Klaus-Jürgen Gern (IfW), Markku Kotilainen (ETLA), Paolo
Onofri
(PROMETEIA), Iulia Siedschlag (ESRI), Henri Sterdyniak (OFCE), Catherine Mathieu
(OFCE,
Scientific Secretary)
Local Organising Committee (NIESR, London)
Ray Barrell, Dawn Holland, Simon Kirby; Phil Davis (NIESR and Brunel Univ)
Contacts - Abstract and paper submissions
Ray Barrell: rbarrell@niesr.ac.uk
Catherine Mathieu: catherine.mathieu@ofce.sciences-po.fr, tel.: +33 (0) 1 44 18 54 37
This year will be the first for some time that official unemployment
rates will rise. The overall predictions are that there could be around
a million people unemployed in Australia by year's end. The
underemployment rate will also rise.
The Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE) will be holding its'
annual conference 3rd - 4th December 2009. This will be the 11th Path
to Full Employment Conference / 16th National Conference on
Unemployment. The conference will be held at the University of
Newcastle, Australia.
At present, around 10 per cent of the available labour force is unable
to get enough work. If this downturn approaches the depth of the 1991
recession, this figure will jump to 20 per cent or more. A strong
employment-centric federal response is needed to avoid an escalation in
joblessness. This year's conference will be particularly important in
sharing ideas from the best researchers in the area about how we can
avoid major labour market devastation.
This years' theme will be:
underemployment
Labour underutilisation - unemployment and
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Papers are particularly welcome in the following research and policy
areas:
* What are the origins of the global financial crisis? Is the
Australian government's response adequate? How could it be improved?
* Any research on unemployment - its dimensions, causes, cures
* The increasing problem of underemployment and marginal workers.
* Why has work become more precarious? Is it a problem? What are the
solutions?
* What is full employment? How is it defined and measured? How close
are we to achieving full employment? What are the challenges that
remain?
* How can the new Federal Government's social inclusion agenda be
designed and implemented?
* Employment guarantees - why are several countries now turning to Job
Guarantee-type policies to combat poverty and unemployment? What are
the lessons for Australia?
* Why do disparities in regional labour markets persist? What is the
extent of the problem and its solutions? Spatial patterns of work and
housing.
* Long term, youth, disabled and indigenous unemployment.
Contributions can be made to both the Refereed (peer reviewed) or Non Refereed streams. Refereed papers will be included in a printed volume
of conference proceedings (which will constitute a refereed conference
paper under Australian government rules).
Deadlines:
Abstracts in both the refereed (peer reviewed) or Non - Refereed
streams - Monday 13th July 2009 5pm.
Draft Refereed Papers - Monday, September 28, 2009 Final Refereed
Papers and registration payment - October 31, 2009.
NB: Refereeing will take place between September 28, 2009 and October
19, 2009.
You will have 2 weeks to address the referees' comments and make any
necessary changes.
Non - Refereed Papers and registration payment - Monday, November 2,
2009.
Those interested are asked to visit our website
http://e1.newcastle.edu.au/coffee/conferences/2009/guidelines.cfm for
detailed paper submission guidelines as well as paper deadlines.
Please submit your abstract to the CofFEE office:
coffee@newcastle.edu.au
Details relating to Key Note Speakers and registration will follow in
coming months.
Regards
The CofFEE Team.
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Workshop on Markets, Governance and Human Development: Call for Papers
Jointly organised by: Development Studies Association (Environmental Resources and
Sustainable Development Study Group, and Development Ethics Study Group)
and Robinson College, University of Cambridge
6-7 July 2009. Venue: Robinson College, Cambridge
Keynote speakers:

Professor Marc Fleurbaey, CERSES, Universit Paris Descartes

Professor Tim Jackson, University of Surrey

Professor Alan Kirman, GREQAM, EHESS, IUF, France

Professor John O.Neill, University of Manchester
Workshop aims:
In the current economic crisis, an important question to revisit concerns when and to
what extent markets are appropriate mechanisms to deliver goods and services to
consumers, satisfy their desires and also contribute to human and economic development.
For some economists, it is of no doubt that a freemarket economy has overwhelmingly
positive aspects and offers a wide set of opportunities to many people. However, for the
critics of the free-market economy, it is often the poorest sections of the community that
suffer most. Others argue that state intervention in such situations usually means that the
taxpayer as well as the more prudent average saver will have to pay for the failures of
rich speculators. Have we come to the end of "liberal market economy"? Can markets
'correct' themselves? Are we expecting markets to deliver services for which they are not
the most appropriate institutions? Are we witnessing a period of a particular market
failure, or is it a "system failure"? Do we need 'deeper' and more active governance of
international and national financial systems to prevent further events like this to happen?
If so, how can we achieve this?
It is clear that discussion of such questions cannot be confined to examinations within
boundaries of a single discipline. A broader dialogue drawing from insights and
viewpoints from different disciplines is required. Such discussion should include views
on the ways markets work, the channels through which they can and do contribute to
advancing human development through creation of opportunities and widening the range
of functionings and capabilities.There is a need to re-examine issues related to the values
and psychological mindframes underpinning markets and the power structures they
produce. As Amartya Sen (2008) mentions in passing in the Martin Luther King Lecture:
There is no such thing as "the" market solution, for the market is exactly as good as the
company it keeps. It is extremely important to recognise that the market economy can
yield very different results, depending on governing conditions, such as the distribution
of resources and opportunities to develop skill and to secure fair bases of entry into
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market transactions, which in turn depend on the support of public distribution of
education and health care, better functioning of trade agreements, reform of patent laws
and environmental regulations, the operation of credit facilities, among many other
influencing factors. All these influences are open to reform and change.
Against, this background, this workshop aims to examine two sets of issues:
a. Markets and human development: Issues under this theme include, for example: what
evidence is there to suggest that markets can deliver pro-poor growth and sustainable
human development; how compatible are values such as "market-rationality" and human
development; are markets "only" delivering efficiency at the cost of equity; are markets
the main reason for current global environmental changes; should there be institutions
that temper the role of markets; are there tradeoffs between developing market and social
institutions (as for example, suggested by Marglin, 2006), do markets give "by nature"
more power to entrepreneurs and traders than to other market participants?
b. Governance and human development: Issues under this theme include: how much
governance do we need for human development; why are some societies better than other
similar ones in developing institutions; what is the role of accountability in relation to
agency and well-being freedoms - is accountability a prerequisite or an outcome of
improved human development; can governance effectively counterbalance power
relations that were established through the market, does governance work with the market
or (does it need to work) against the market?
We welcome papers that explore these issues theoretically and/or empirically from within
the disciplines of economics and other social sciences and philosophy. Some selected
papers will be proposed for publication in special issues of international refereed
journals.
Registration fee will apply to cover college accommodation and catering. Further details
will be sent if paper is accepted.
Submission: Please submit extended abstracts/proposals of 1,000 - 1,500 words by 25th
March 2009. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you need any clarifications. Abstracts
should be sent to:
Dr P.B. Anand
University of Bradford
p.b.anand@bradford.ac.uk
Dr Des Gasper
Institute of Social Studies, The Hague
gasper@iss.nl
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Dr Miriam Teschl
Robinson College, Cambridge
mt367@cam.ac.uk
http://www.robinson.cam.ac.uk/academic/markets09.php
Conferences, Seminars and Lectures
NANCY FRASER AT THE INSTITUTE OF CONTEMPORARY ARTS
Monday 09 March at 7.00 pm
To commemorate her recently published Adding Insult to Injury, as well as Scales of Justice,
Nancy Fraser will speak at the ICA on 09 March, in conversation with Anne Phillips, Professor of
Political and Gender Theory at LSE, and a contributor to Adding Insult to Injury. Fraser examines
the changes in leftist accounts of injustice since the collapse of Communism and the rise of
identity politics. These accounts have strayed from a traditional focus on economic harms such
as poverty, exploitation, and inequality; attention has turned increasingly towards cultural issues
such as cultural imperialism, ‘misrecognition’, and disrespect. This development raises serious
questions; how can the Left do justice to the legitimate claims of multiculturalism without
abandoning its commitment to economic equality? How can it broaden the understanding of an
injustice that adds (cultural) insult to (economic) injury?
Tickets available from:
http://www.ica.org.uk/From%20Insult%20to%20Injury+19175.twl
---------------------------------------ADDING INSULT TO INJURY
Nancy Fraser Debates her Critics
By Nancy Fraser
Edited by Kevin Olson
“For more than a decade, Nancy Fraser’s thought has helped to reframe the agenda of critical
theory. Today, when egalitarian hopes flicker and shine against the background of pervasive
repression, Adding Insult to Injury provides a singular stimulation.” Etienne Balibar
16
Adding Insult to Injury tracks the debate sparked by Nancy Fraser's controversial effort to
combine redistribution, recognition, and representation in a new understanding of social justice.
The volume showcases Fraser's critical exchanges with leading thinkers, including Judith Butler,
Richard Rorty, Iris Marion Young, Anne Phillips, and Rainer Forst. The result is a wide-ranging
and at times contentious exploration of varied approaches to rebuilding the Left.
NANCY FRASER is Loeb Professor of Philosophy and Politics at the New School for Social
Research and holder of a Chaire Blaise Pascal at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences
Sociales in Paris. Her books include Redistribution or Recognition: A Political-Philosophical
Exchange (with Axel Honneth), Justice Interruptus: Critical Reflections on the “Postsocialist”
Condition, and Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse and Gender in Contemporary Social Theory.
---------------------------------------ISBN 9781859842232 / £16.99 / $29.95 / Paperback / 360 pages / Published November 2008
Adding Insult to Injury is available from all good bookshops and at:
http://www.versobooks.com/books/cdef/ef-titles/fraser_n_adding_insult_to_injury.shtml
UK
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Adding-Insult-Injury-RedistributionRepresentation/dp/1859842232/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1234451423&sr=8-2
US
http://www.amazon.com/Adding-Insult-Injury-RedistributionRepresentation/dp/1859842232/ref=pd_bbs_sr_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1234451521&sr=8-3
The CICSE Lectures on Growth and Development
Inequality and the Process of Development
by Oded Galor (Brown University)
8-10 June 2009
University of Naples "Parthenope", Villa Doria d'Angri, via Petrarca n. 80
Naples, Italy
The CICSE (http://cicse.ec.unipi.it/) announces that the second "CICSE Lectures on
Growth and Development", in collaboration with the Department of Economics,
University "Parthenope" of Naples, will be delivered by Prof. Oded Galor, Herbert H.
Goldberger Professor of Economics, Brown University, Providence, RI, USA
http://www.econ.brown.edu/fac/Oded_Galor/.
The CICSE Lectures are planned to provide invited scholars with the opportunity to
recollect and reorganize their ideas, to present them in a more general format, to provide
proofs of special cases or some empirical studies that in short presentations like that of an
article of a journal cannot be exhaustively treated, and to provide deeper analyses of
some points. Once delivered a set of Lectures are collected in a book published by
17
Cambridge University Press in the "CICSE Lectures on Growth and Development"
Series. The first set of Lectures were delivered by Stephen J. Turnovsky on "Capital
Accumulation and Economic Growth in a Small Open Economy" and the book is
currently in press.
The three Lectures by Professor Galor are on " Inequality and the Process of
Development". More precisely they are on
Lecture 1 (June 8, afternoon):
Modern Perspective
Lecture 2 (June 9, morning):
Lecture 3(June 10, morning):
Policies
From the Classical and Neoclassical Approach to The
A Unified Approach
Inequality and Growth Promoting Human Capital
All interested scholars are free to attend the CICSE Lectures at Villa Doria d'Angri, via
Petrarca 80
Naples, Italy, but they need to be registered within May 20, 2009. Registration is possible
through the page
http://cicse.ec.unipi.it/content/inequality_and_the_process_of_development.html
where further information on the Lectures are found.
The afternoon of the 9th will be devoted to a Poster Session with the Oded Galor's
participation. The deadline for delivering a poster is March 31, 2009. The application
requires registration within March 31 and an abstract sent to cicse-lecture@ec.unipi.it
ISET's European Interdisciplinary Spring 2009 Seminar Series 'New
Europe: Security, Politics and Cultural Change'
launches on Monday 2 March 6-7.30 pm with a talk on:
New Europe, new crisis: Perspectives on financial instability and
economic cooperation Laszlo Andor: European Bank for Reconstruction and
Development
The new member states of the European Union have produced very dynamic
economic growth in the last 6-8 years. However, they have been badly
affected by the current financial crisis, and they are not expected to
return to their robust development after the end of the crisis,
whenever that may come. The current crisis, therefore, highlights the
surviving asymmetries in Europe, and also the fact that the
institutional arrangements of the EU (and particularly the Economic and
Monetary Union within that) cannot handle these imbalances. In a way,
most of the new member states find themselves facing a position other
EU members were in before 1992: being part of the single market,
exposed to the free flow of capital but managing their macroeconomies
with their own national currencies. The manifestation of economic
weakness and financial fragility in the Eastern half of the EU is
18
another test of European cohesion. New forms of economic integration
among the new member states would be needed to strengthen their
economic fundamentals, and new policies within the EU framework would
be needed to create more financial stability within the region. More
sustainable development in East-Central Europe and the Balkans could
also contribute to deeper and wider cooperation between the EU and the
Commonwealth of Independent States.
László Andor is associate professor at Corvinus University of Budapest
(BCE, Department of Economic Policy) and at King Sigismund College
(ZSKF). Currently he is a member of the board of directors at the
European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in London.
Future Seminars:
Security socialization? The national security concepts of the Central
and Eastern European states after NATO and EU enlargement
9 March, Felix Ciuta, School of Slavonic and Eastern European Studies,
UCL
The European imperative: Rescuing the Balkans
16 March, David Chandler, University of Westminster
European culture in transition: The possibility space of
transnationalism
23 March, Kevin Robins, Goldsmiths College and Istanbul Bilgi
University
Russia's conception of a new European security order 30 March, Marko
Bojcun, London Metropolitan University
I look forward to seeing you there - please feel free to pass this on
to anyone interested.
6:00 - 7:30 p.m in The Old Staff Café, London Metropolitan University,
Tower Building, 166-220 Holloway Road - ALL WELCOME - refreshments
provided
Administrator
Institute for the Study of European Transformations (ISET) London
Metropolitan University 166-220 Holloway Road London N7 8DB
iset@londonmet.ac.uk www.londonmet.ac.uk/iset
AFTER THE CRASH
A series of lectures and seminars dedicated to an enquiry into the nature
and causes of the de-wealthing of nations, as precipitated by the 2008
financial meltdown
Dear friends,
19
UADPhilEcon (the University of Athens doctoral program in economics) is
organising a series of public lectures to be held during the next five months on
the big issue of the day: the financial meltdown and the global recession it
triggered. We would be thrilled if you could attend at least some of these
lectures. They promise to throw much valuable light on developments the world
over.
The series is inaugurated by Gary Dymski (University of California, Sacramento)
on Monday 16/2 to Friday 20/2 DAILY, at 17.00.
All lectures will take place at UADPhilEcon's 6th floor Seminar Room, 14
Evripidou Street. To find us, click here. For more information, please write to
info@uadphilecon.gr or call +30-210-3689849.
I hope to see you in one or more of these lectures.
Yanis Varoufakis
AFTER THE CRASH
The lectures
Lectures 1 to 5: GARY DYMSKI is offering a mini course (comprising 5
lectures) on Financial Development, Financial Exclusion and the Financial
Crises – Monday 16/2, Tuesday 17/2, Wednesday 18/2, Thursday 19/2 and
Friday 20/2, at 17.00-20.00
Gary Dymski is Professor of Economics and Director of the University of
California Centre at Sacramento. UADPhilEcon is pleased to announce the minilecture course that Gary will be offering, daily, for the week beginning Monday
16th February.
Lectures are scheduled for Monday 16/2, Tuesday 17/2, Wednesday 18/2,
Thursday 19/2, Friday 20/2 between 17.00 and 20.00.
A complete reading list, for the entire course, can be downloaded here. Of those
the following can be downloaded by clicking below:
·
·
·
·
·
John Maynard Keynes, “The General Theory”, QJE, 1937
Veronika Dolar and Césaire Meh, “Financial Structure and Economic
Growth: A Non Technical Survey,” Bank of Canada Working Paper 200224. Ottawa: Monetary and Financial Analysis Department, Bank of
Canada, September 2002.
Joseph E. Stiglitz and Andrew Weiss, “Credit Rationing in Markets with
Imperfect Information,” American Economic Review, March 1983.
Joseph Stiglitz, Vallejo and Park (1993). “The role of the state in
financial markets”, World Bank Research Observer
Hyman Minsky, “Money, financial markets and the coherence of a
market economy”, Journal of Economic Issues 20:2, June 1986.
20
Hyman Minsky, “The Evolution of Financial Institutions and the
Performance of the Economy,” Journal of Economic Issues 20:2, June
1986.
·
Gary A. Dymski and Robert Pollin, “Hyman Minsky as Hedgehog: The
Power of the Wall Street Paradigm," with Robert Pollin, in Financial
Conditions and Macroeconomic Performance. Ed. Steven Fazzari.
Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1993: 27-62.
·
Gary A. Dymski, “Financial Globalization, Social Exclusion, and
Financial Crisis,” International Review of Applied Economics, Vol. 19(4),
November 2005: 441-459.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Lecture 6: SILVANA DE PAULA (Rio de Janeiro), Friday 20/2, at 15.00
Silvana de Paula is professor at the Graduate Program of Social Sciences in
Agriculture, Development and Society
(CPDA) of the Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRRJ). She is also
professor of the Graduate Program on Public Policies, Development and
Strategies (PPDE), at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), where
she teaches a course regarding social responsibility of firms and civil society
organizations. Her topic for our UADPhilEcon seminar is entitled:
·
Urban scene: from the eye of the flaneur to the electronic eye
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Lecture 7: JONATHAN NITZAN (York, Canada), Monday 23/2, at 18.00
Jonathan Nitzan is professor of political science at the Faculty of Arts of York
University, Canada. He has recently authored a book (published by Routledge)
entitled Capital as Power. (For more material on Jonathan’s work, click the
following links: The Bichler & Nitzan Archives and Critical Mass: A Forum on
Political Economy and Power) Jonathan’s lecture at UADPhilEcon will bear the
same title as the aforementioned book.
Capital as Power
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Lectures 8&9: STUART HOLLAND (Coimbra, Portugal), Tuesday 24/2 and
Thursday 26/2 at 18.00
Stuart Holland is an former member of British Parliament, academic economist,
protagonist during some of the more poignant institutional moments of the
European Union and, last but not least, a friend of and regular visitor at
UADPhilEcon. His two talks will be centred upon the following, related,
questions and will allude powerfully to the structure and nature of a desirable
New Bretton Woods.
Crisis for economic theory?
Crisis for capitalism?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Lecture 10: SHEILA DOW (Stirling, Scotland), Tuesday 7/4, at 18.00
21
Sheila Dow is professor of economics at the University of Stirling. Her research
interests include the methodology of economics and the theory of money,
banking and monetary policy. Her talk at UADPhilEcon will be entitled
On the psychology of Financial Markets
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Lecture 11: DAVID LAIBMAN (Brooklyn College, CUNY, USA and
UADPhilEcon, University of Athens), Tuesday 5/5, at 18.00
David Laibman is Professor of Economics at Brooklyn College and the Graduate
School, City University of New York. He is also the Editor of Science & Society.
Laibman is the author of three books: Value, Technical Change and Crisis:
Explorations in Marxist Economic Theory (1992), Capitalist Macrodynamics: A
Systematic Introduction (1997), and Deep History: A Study in Social Evolution
and Human Potential (2007). He is also a fingerstyle guitarist, especially its
application to the ragtime music of the early twentieth century. With Eric
Schoenberg, Laibman recorded The New Ragtime Guitar for Folkways Records
in 1970. His solo album, Classical Ragtime Guitar, was released by Rounder
Records in 1980.[4] He has just issued a DVD, Guitar Artistry of David Laibman
Stefan Grossman Guitar Workshop, 2007. David’s contribution to
UADPhilEcon’s series is entitled:
The crisis from a value perspective (not clickable)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Lecture 12: COSTAS LAPAVITSAS (SOAS, University of London), Tuesday
12/5, at 18.00
Costas Lapavitsas is Reader in Economics at SOAS, University of London where
he teaches Finance, Development Economics and Marxian Political Economy.
His presentation at UADPhilEcon will span these topics with a view to throw
explanatory light on the current global economic crisis. His tentative title is:
Finance, Development and Crises (not clickable)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Lectures 12&13: GAVAN BUTLER (University of Sydney, Australia, and
Thammasat University, Bangkok), Tuesday 19/5 and Thursday 20/5, both at
18.00
Gavan Butler is professor of political economy at the University of Sydney where
he has been instrumental in the setting up of a successful degree in political
economy (both as the graduate and the postgraduate levels) as well as the
Australian Journal of Political Economy. Gavan also teaches in Thailand, at the
Thammasat University in Bangkok. His research interests include economic
development and crises in South East Asia. His topic for the UADPhilEcon
lectures is:
Globalisation, the Crash of 2008 and possible East Asian regional
responses
22
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Lecture 14: CHRISTIAN ARNSPERGER (Université Catholique de Louvain,
Belgium), June 2009 (precise date tba)
Christian Arnsperger teaches economic philosophy at the Catholic University of
Louvain, in Belgium, and is the author of (among others) a recent book entitled
Critical Political Economy. He is also a regular visitor at UADPhilEcon and will
offer his perspective on the Crash of 2008 and beyond in a talk provisionally
entitled:
After the Crash: Will the economic crisis revive critical political
economics? (not clickable)
Power to the People?
... masses, proletariat, workers, soviets, nation, community,
subalterns,
multitude, commons...
Radical Philosophy Conference, Central London, 9 May 2009
BOOK NOW!
£25/£10 unwaged
Registration and further details: matt.charles@blueyonder.co.uk
Cheques payable to `Radical Philosophy Ltd' should be sent
to: Radical Philosophy Conference, Peter Osborne, CRMEP, Middlesex
University, Trent Park Campus, Bramley Rd, London N14 4YZ
Plenary (chair: Peter Osborne, RP)
`They, the People'
Gayatri Spivak (Columbia University, NY)
The General Will (chair: Peter Hallward, RP)
'The General Will on the Street'
David Andress (Portsmouth)
'How Do the People Make Themselves Heard?'
Sophie Wahnich (CNRS, Paris)
23
Urban Collectivities (chair: David Cunningham, RP)
'Urban Intersections and the Politics of Anticipation'
AbdouMaliq Simone (Goldsmiths)
`Urbanism and the Post-Political'
Erik Swyngedouw (Manchester)
Population & Biopolitics (chair: Stuart Elden, Durham)
'Biopolitics, Diasporas and (Neo)Liberal Political Economy'
Couze Venn (Nottingham Trent)
'Feminist Strategies Revisited - Sexopolitics, Multitude and
Biopolitics'
Encarnacion Gutierrez Rodriguez (Manchester)
Class, Commons & Multitude (chair: Esther Leslie, RP)
'Crisis, Tragedies and the Commons'
Massimo De Angelis (UEL)
`Power to the people!' was once a revolutionary slogan, but reference
to government by the people and for the people soon became an empty
cliché of the post-revolutionary status quo. The people has become a
notoriously ambiguous and contested term, for which numerous
alternatives have been proposed: the proletariat, the workers, the
masses, the soviets, the nation, the community, the multitude, the
commons... And now? How might we assess the different conceptions of
political change embodied in these often conflicting ideas? What is the
political and philosophical significance of `the people' today?
£25/£10 unwaged
Registration and further details: matt.charles@blueyonder.co.uk
Cheques payable to `Radical Philosophy Ltd' should be sent to:Radical
Philosophy Conference, Peter Osborne, CRMEP, Middlesex University,
Trent Park Campus, Bramley Rd, London N14 4YZ
<radicalphilosophy@yahoo.com>
24
WORKSHOP
“Valutazione della ricerca e reclutamento universitario”
http://www.storep.org/workshop2009/
Lunedì 6 aprile 2009
h 11.00 - 17.00
Università del Piemonte Orientale,
Facoltà di Giurisprudenza
Palazzo Borsalino,
via Cavour 84, Alessandria
Organizzato da
Associazione Italiana per la Storia dell’Economia Politica
STOREP
in collaborazione con
Facoltà di Giurisprudenza
Dipartimento di Scienze Giuridiche ed Economiche
Dipartimento di Politiche Pubbliche e Scelte Collettive
Università del Piemonte Orientale
Cooperation and Development Network (CDN)
Summer School on Structural Change: Analyses, Experiences and
Methodologies
3-16 June 2009
Over the last few years the international debate on economic policies, and especially on
development
policies, witnessed the emergence of views alternative to the Washington consensus.
The current
economic events at the world level – people are more worried about deflation than
inflation, industrialists
are asking the governments to spend more rather than less, etc. – make a full
understanding of such
alternative views more needed than ever.
The Summer School is organized in two parts. The first aims at providing participants
with a good
knowledge of the main theories belonging to the tradition of the so called “heterodox
economics”, which
25
constitute the intellectual background of the alternative views mentioned before. The
second part aims at
providing participants with the technical skills needed to build the so called heterodox
Computable
General Equilibrium (CGE) models, an analytical tool through which the above
mentioned views may be
translated into concrete calculations on the likely effects of different sets of alternative
economic policies.
Tentative program
3 June: Introductory Class
Opening Lecture: tba
4-9 June 2009: Theoretical lectures
- The historical and analytical background of the structuralist approach (Gianni Vaggi,
University of
Pavia and University Institute for Advanced Studies – IUSS - Pavia)
- Structuralist Microeconomics (Mario Cimoli, CEPAL, Santiago de Chile; Giovanni Dosi,
Sant’Anna
School Pisa,)
- Keynesian Macroeconomics (Amit Bhaduri, University of Pavia)
- Heterodox approaches to international finance (Roberto Frenkel, CEDES, Buenos
Aires)
- Structural change and development policies (Gioacchino Garofoli, University of
Insubria; Claude
Courlet, University Pierre Mendès France Grenoble; Robert Wade, London School of
Economics)
10-16 June 2009: Empirical Applications
- Structuralist CGE modelling (Rudiger von Armin, University of Denver; Marco
Missaglia, University
of Pavia and University Institute for Advanced Studies – IUSS - Pavia)
The second part of the Summer School will be devoted to structuralist and
post/Keynesian CGE
models. What will the students learn?
A CGE model – regardless of its nature, neoclassical or not – is a set of simultaneous
equations
describing the production behaviors in the different sectors of the economy, the
demands
expressed by different institutions and the equilibrium conditions in the different markets
taken
into consideration. In most CGE models with a neoclassical persuasion only the real side
of the
economy is investigated – money is nothing but a “veil”; in structuralist and postKeynesian CGE
model assets market are also included. In neoclassical model macro causality runs from
savings to
investments, whereas structuralist and post-Keynesian models are built around the
opposite view,
investments determine savings. In neoclassical models unemployment originates in the
labour
market (eventually from profit-maximizing choices of the entrepreneurs), whereas
structuralists
and post-Keynesians believe the origin of unemployment is to be found in the product
26
market. Etc..
The students will learn: a) how these and other differences are modeled and b) how
these
differences affect the outcomes of various possible policy simulations.
More specifically:
a) Before the starting of the summer school the participants will be provided with
technical notes
containing a step-by-step explanation of the procedure needed to build a CGE model.
b) During the summer school the participants will learn, again through a step-by-step
approach, the
procedure needed to build a structuralist/post-Keynesian CGE model. They will be
taught useful
techniques to run several policy simulations (trade policies, macro policies, industrial
policies, tax
policies).
Given the nature of this part of the Summer School, classes will be mainly held in the
computer lab.
In any case, students are encouraged to come to Pavia with their own laptops.
Participation fee
- 1,000 euro: inclusive of course tuition and didactic material
- 1,500 euro: inclusive of course tuition, didactic material and accommodation (this
option is subject
to housing availability and thus reserved to early comers)
Non-refundable registration fee: 35 euro
Location: Faculty of Economics, University of Pavia, Via San Felice 7, 27100 Pavia –
Italy
Organized by the Cooperation and Development Network (CDN) in collaboration with the
University of
Pavia, the Institute for Advanced Study of Pavia (IUSS) and the University of Insubria.
For further
information regarding the organization of the Summer School please refer to: Alberto
Botta
(albertobotta@hotmail.com) and/or Francesca Montagna Napoleone (cdn@unipv.it),
Development
School: c/o Collegio Santa Caterina, Via San Martino 17/A, 27100 Pavia – IT. Tel: 390382-22540, Fax: 390382-307861: www.unipv.it/iuss/cds.
For further information regarding the specific contents of each module, please refer to
Marco Missaglia
(marco.missaglia@unipv.it)
Dear Friends and Past Conference Participants,
27
We are pleased to invite you to the upcoming Left Forum conference, April 17-19 at
Pace University in New York City (across the street from City Hall, next to the Brooklyn
Bridge entrance).
This is the Left Forum's first year at Pace, and so far it has been the most collaborative
conference we have organized; we have benefited from the active engagement of Pace
students, faculty, and staff, as well as the input and support from the surrounding
community. With wide-ranging contributions from artists, community organizers, and
scholars from around the world, and more scheduled panels and speakers than ever
before, the 2009 Left Forum appears poised to contribute to the type of critical dialogues
needed at this historical moment. While there is no doubt that the times call for nothing
less, we are humbled at the extent of the involvement of people and Left communities
from around the region, country and the world.
A few of the more than 150 confirmed panels include:
o
On the Brink of Depression: Turning Point in World Capitalism?
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
Nationalization of the Auto Industry
Childhood, Capitalism and Resistance
Crisis Politics: What Way Forward for Obama?
Afghanistan & the Global Peace Movement
Women, Incarceration and Resistance
Religion & Empire: A Christian-Marxist Dialogue
Black Workers and the Current Economic Crisis
China's Labor Movement: Global Dimensions
Debating Long Term Strategies for "the Left"
Left Psychology Explores US Personal Life
Illustrating Resistance: Art & Activism
The End of the Sexuality & Culture Wars?
Street Children of Tegucigalpa & Wash. Politics
The Debate Over Green Capitalism
Health Care Reform: Building Left Unity Is Critical
Progressive Program for Financial Reconstruction
New School Occupation, New Political Moment?
Systematic Destruction of Poor Black & Latino Families in NYC
State Capitalism - a new, New Deal?
Gay Marriage: Should the Left Care?
Hip Hop and the Left
Gaza - Jews & Arabs Speak Out
Corporate Media's Magic Trick: Disappearance of the Working Class
o The Food Democracy Movement
A few of the confirmed speakers include:
28
1. Arlie Hochschild
2. Walden Bello
3. Adolph Reed
4. Richard D. Wolff
5. Barbara Kopple
6. Stanley Aronowitz
7. Frances Fox Piven
8. Gihan Perera
9. Barbara Epstein
10. Bill Fletcher, Jr.
11. Barbara Ransby
12. Katja Kipping
13. Laura Flanders
14. Bobby Seale
15. Jose LaLuz
16. Craig Calhoun
17. Ai-jen Poo
18. Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
19. Benjamin Chavis
20. Anwar Shaikh
21. Harmony Goldberg
22. Richard Kim
23. Hugo Blanco
24. Sahar Shafqat
25. Robin Blackburn
26. Radhika Balakrishnan
27. Staughton Lynd
28. Sheila Collins
29. Jeff Chang
30. Nomi Prins
31. Leo Panitch
32. Ruth Wilson Gilmore
33. Doug Henwood
34. Houzan Mahmoud
35. Bashir Abu-Manneh
36. Silvia Rivera
37. Cindy Milstein
38. JoAnn Wypijewski
39. Douglas Kellner
40. Mark Solomon
41. Jane Slaughter
42. Marsha Neimier
43. Roger Salerno
44. Laura Whitehorn
45. Brigitte Kahl
46. John Bellamy Foster
29
47. Michael Menser
48. Ching Kwan Lee
49. Bertell Ollman
Among the highlights of the weekend will be a Saturday performance event, including
excerpts from "The Cradle Will Rock" by Pace/Actor's Studio, "Letters from
Guantanamo," music, dance, and more; a day of student discussions, panels, and
roundtables (all of which will precede the opening plenary); and theater, visual art, and
film integrated into the panels, hallways, and performance events. Attached is the
conference announcement graphic (if you can, download it, copy it and send to email
lists, post it online, or print it up - to encourage people to come to the Forum).
Please join us for this extraordinary political moment. To register for the conference go
to: register for Left Forum 2009 Conference.
We look forward to seeing you on the 17th of April,
The Volunteers, Staff and Board Members of the Left Forum
Left Forum
leftforum@leftforum.org
THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF CENTRAL BANKING / LA POLITIQUE
ECONOMIQUE DE LA BANQUE CENTRALE
TORONTO, ONTARIO, CANADA
27-28 MAY, 2009 / 27-28 MAI, 2009
Sponsored by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council /Finance par le Conseil de Recherche
en Sciences Humaines.
WEDNESDAY MAY 27 / MERCREDI 27 MAI, 2009
9h00
Accueil et remarques préliminaires
Welcome and Opening Remarks
9h30 – 10h00
THE REAL POLICY RATE AND THE BUSINESS CYCLE
John Smithin (York Univeristy, Canada)
30
10h05 – 10h35
FISCAL AND MONETARY POLICY INTERACTIONS: LESSONS FOR A REVISED STABILITY
AND GROWTH PACT
Mark Setterfield (Trinity College, USA)
10H35 – 11H00
PAUSE CAFÉ / COFFEE BREAK
11h05 – 11h35
ON THE RATIONALE AND FEASIBILITY OF THE KANSAS CITY RULE
Scott Fullwiller (Wartburg College, USA)
11h40 – 12h10
THE BANK OF CANADA ON THE VERGE OF TAKING A WRONG TURN : THE TEMPTATION FOR
A ZERO-INFLATION OR PRICE-LEVEL TARGET
Marc Lavoie et Mario Seccareccia
(Univeristy of Ottawa, Canada)
12h15 – 13h00
Comments, questions, general discussion
13H10 – 14H20 LUNCH
MILESTONE RESTAURANT
14h40 – 15h10
THE EURO AND ITS GUARDIAN OF STABILITY
Joerg Bibow (Skidmore College, USA)
15h15 – 15h45
UNE TENTATIVE DE MODÉLISATION POST KEYNÉSIENNE DE LA CRISE BANCAIRE DE 2008
Edwin LeHeron (Universite de Bordeaux, France)
15H45 – 16H10
PAUSE CAFÉ / COFFEE BREAK
16h15 – 16h45
INTEREST RATE RULES AND CENTRAL BANK PERFORMANCE
Peter Docherty (University Technilogy, Sidney, Australia)
31
16h50 – 17h20
17h20 – 18h00
Commentaires, questions et discussion générale Comments, questions, general discussion
18h30
Rendez-vous dans le hall de l’hôtel
Meeting in the hotel lobby
18h45
Reception at Louis-Philippe’s
(20 minute walk – 5 minutes cab)
20h00
Dîner – conference
The Peartree Restaurant
THURSDAY MAY 28 / JEUDI 28 MAI 2009
9h00
Café et accueil des participants
Coffee and Welcome
9h30 – 10h00
CENTRAL BANK RESPONSES TO FINANCIAL CRISES: LENDERS
INTERESTING TIMES
Robert Dimand (Brock Univerity, Canada)
OF
LAST RESORT
IN
10h05 – 10h35
CENTRAL BANK BEHAVIOUR IN TIMES OF FINANCIAL CRISES
Paul Davidson (New School University, USA)
10H35 – 11H00
PAUSE CAFÉ / COFFEE BREAK
11h05 – 11h35
JAPANESE MONETARY POLICY AND THE CHALLENGE
TRAP
Brian MacLean (Laurentian University, Canada)
OF
ESCAPING
FROM A
DEFLATION
11h40 – 12h10
THE CHALLENGES OF CENTRAL BANKING IN THE ERA OF FINANCE-LED CAPITALISM
Robert Guttmann (Hofstra University, USA)
12h15 – 13h00
32
Comments, questions, general discussion
13h10 – 14H20 LUNCH
MILESTONE RESTAURANT
14h45 – 15h15
THINKING OUTSIDE THE BANKER’S BOX: RETHINKING THE ROLE OF THE CENTRAL BANK IN A
TIME OF ECOLOGICAL CRISIS
Michael Carr (University of New Brunswick, Canada)
15h20 – 15h50
FROM CHARTALISM TO INDEPENDENCE: THE ROLE OF CENTRAL BANKS
DEVELOPMENT
Hassan Bougrine and Corinne Pastoret
(Laurentian University, Canada)
IN
GROWTH AND
15H50 – 16H20
PAUSE CAFÉ / COFFEE BREAK
16h25 – 16h55
POST-KEYNESIAN ALTERNATIVES TO CENTRAL BANK POLICY
Angel Asensio (Universite de Paris 13, France)
17h00 – 17h45
Comments, questions, general discussion
For more information, contact Louis-Philippe Rochon, at Lprochon2003@yahoo.com or
Lprochon@Laurnetian.ca
ISET's European Interdisciplinary Spring 2009 Seminar Series 'New
Europe: Security, Politics and Cultural Change' launches on Monday
2 March 6-7.30 pm with a talk on:
New Europe, new crisis: Perspectives on financial instability and
economic cooperation Laszlo Andor: European Bank for Reconstruction and
Development
The new member states of the European Union have produced very dynamic
economic growth in the last 6-8 years. However, they have been badly
affected by the current financial crisis, and they are not expected to
return to their robust development after the end of the crisis,
whenever that may come. The current crisis, therefore, highlights the
surviving asymmetries in Europe, and also the fact that the
institutional arrangements of the EU (and particularly the Economic and
33
Monetary Union within that) cannot handle these imbalances. In a way,
most of the new member states find themselves facing a position other
EU members were in before 1992: being part of the single market,
exposed to the free flow of capital but managing their macroeconomies
with their own national currencies. The manifestation of economic
weakness and financial fragility in the Eastern half of the EU is
another test of European cohesion. New forms of economic integration
among the new member states would be needed to strengthen their
economic fundamentals, and new policies within the EU framework would
be needed to create more financial stability within the region. More
sustainable development in East-Central Europe and the Balkans could
also contribute to deeper and wider cooperation between the EU and the
Commonwealth of Independent States.
László Andor is associate professor at Corvinus University of Budapest
(BCE, Department of Economic Policy) and at King Sigismund College
(ZSKF). Currently he is a member of the board of directors at the
European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in London.
Future Seminars:
Security socialization? The national security concepts of the Central
and Eastern European states after NATO and EU enlargement
9 March, Felix Ciuta, School of Slavonic and Eastern European Studies,
UCL
The European imperative: Rescuing the Balkans
16 March, David Chandler, University of Westminster
European culture in transition: The possibility space of
transnationalism
23 March, Kevin Robins, Goldsmiths College and Istanbul Bilgi
University
Russia's conception of a new European security order 30 March, Marko
Bojcun, London Metropolitan University
I look forward to seeing you there - please feel free to pass this on
to anyone interested.
6:00 - 7:30 p.m in The Old Staff Café, London Metropolitan University,
Tower Building, 166-220 Holloway Road - ALL WELCOME - refreshments
provided
Public Debate
Learning through recession:
Competitiveness, social cohesion and lifelong learning
34
Monday 9 March, 13:00 – 15:00 pm at National Institute of Economic and
Social Research, 2 Dean Trench Street, Smith Square, London, SW1P 3HE
Buffet lunch available 12:30 – 13:00
We are delighted to invite you to a ‘Question Time’ style debate about the impact of
global recession on competitiveness and social cohesion and the role that lifelong
learning might play in any recovery. The debate will address a range of current issues.
Does the economic crisis signal the end of the road for the so-called Anglo-Saxon
economic model? What new political and economic settlements can ensure prosperity
and social cohesion for future generations? How can we 'learn' our way out of the crisis
and what is the role for learning and skills in the new social and economic order which
must be constructed? This event is part of the Festival of Social Science being run by the
Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) during the National Science &
Engineering week. The panel includes well-known commentators from public life and
members of the ESRC funded LLAKES Research Centre:
Claire Fox (Chair): Director of the Institute of Ideas; David Willetts: Shadow Secretary for
Innovation, Universities and Skills; Professor Andy Green: Director of LLAKES; Professor
Lorna Unwin: Deputy Director of LLAKES; Dr. Martin Weale: Director of the National
Institute of Economic and Social Research;
We aim to present a diverse range of views in order to stimulate fresh ideas for
policymaking and research. Thus we welcome your active participation through
questions to the panel. Please e-mail us your questions in advance or bring them along
on the day.
For reservations or if you require any further details please contact Magdalini Kolokitha
at: Email: m.kolokitha@ioe.ac.uk; Tel: 020 73315112.
International Confederation of Associations for Pluralism in Economics - News
35
Job Postings for Heterodox Economists
Economic Justice & Human Rights Program Director Position Open Until
Filled
The Women of Color Resource Center (WCRC) is looking for a skilled,
energetic and resourceful Economic Justice & Human Rights Program
Director rooted firmly in economic and racial justice politics,
feminist analysis, and social transformation at local, national and
international levels.
Founded in 1990 and headquartered in Oakland, the Women of Color
Resource Center (WCRC) is a national political education and leadership
development organization. Its mission is to promote the political,
economic, social and cultural wellbeing of women and girls of color in
the United States. Informed by a social justice perspective that takes
into account the status of women internationally, WCRC is committed to
organizing and educating women across lines of race, ethnicity,
religion, nationality, class, sexual orientation, physical ability and
age. WCRC has embarked on a strategic planning process in 2009, which
will culminate in the creation of a 3-5 year plan.
The two current projects of the EJHR program include the Welfare Rights
Education & Advocacy Project (WREAP), which currently focuses on
research and education strategies related to creating a just welfare
policy, and the Technological Empowerment and Media Project of Oakland
(TEMPO), a skills training and leadership development project for lowincome women.
Responsibilities:
Sustain programmatic components of WREAP & TEMPO projects. Evaluate
past work, current context, and provide recommendations for projects
going forward.
Lead the program redesign and implementation of the overall Economic
Justice & Human Rights program work in relationship to strategic
planning efforts.
Strengthen current partnerships and build new organizational allies.
Work closely with Peace & Solidarity Program Director to develop and
promote cross-program linkages.
Lead and design popular education workshops on economic justice and
human rights topics.
Write articles, blogs and op/eds that reflect organizational political
perspective for broad audiences.
Collaborate with Development Director and Executive Director to advance
fundraising efforts on behalf of program.
Actively participate in organizational assessments, program planning
and evaluation processes.
Engage in additional staff responsibilities and tasks as needed.
Qualifications:
Proven commitment to gender, racial, social and economic justice and a
strong desire to build a broader social justice movement.
Study or training in social movement history, radical political theory,
and/or other relevant political development.
Strong progressive community experience in development leadership and
constituencies among low-income women of color.
36
Policy advocacy and campaign experience to advance programmatic goals.
Familiarity with program planning, evaluation and budgeting processes.
High level of initiative and ability to work well in collaborations.
Solid verbal and written communication skills.
Strong computer skills.
Personable, approachable and flexible.
Salary and hours: This position will be 1.00 FTE with a salary of
$39,000-$43,000 annually. Salary will be commensurate with experience.
Generous benefits, including vacation, holidays, and health and dental
insurance. This staff person should expect to work more than 40 hours
per week, at times, as schedule varies depending on the activities of
the organization. Occasional flexibility with evenings and weekends
required.
How to apply: Submit a resume, cover letter, and 3 references to the
Search Committee at info@coloredgirls.org. No calls, please.
Living Standards/Labor Economist
The Economic Policy Institute is looking for an experienced economist for our flagship Living Standards
program. In that position, the successful candidate would work with the Living Standards team to undertake
a variety of research and analytical projects. They would be responsible for monitoring and commenting on
current economic conditions, including labor market conditions; trends in income and wage outcomes;
factors that impact low- and moderate-income workers; and others. They would also be expected to analyze
and comment on related economic policies.
The position also includes a significant component of research dissemination and communication; working
with EPI's external/communications team to communicate findings to the media, public-interest
organizations, the academic community, and policy makers in Congress and the administration.
The successful candidate would also help set the direction of the program by identifying new areas of inquiry
and shaping programmatic activities.
The position reports directly to the Research and Policy director, but will also work closely with EPI's
president.
About the Living Standards program
The Economic Policy Institute is a nonprofit, nonpartisan think tank that seeks to broaden the public debate
about strategies to achieve a prosperous and fair economy.
EPI's living standards program conducts research and analysis on a range of issues that are core to EPI's
mission, including labor market conditions, policies that impact low- and moderate income workers, work
37
and family issues, poverty, macroeconomic conditions, immigration, family budgets, and income inequality.
EPI's well-known State of Working America biennial publication is primarily authored by the Living
Standards team.
Responsibilities

Conduct analyses of labor market conditions using a variety of publicly available data sources

Represent EPI in the media and other public forums


Work with the Living Standards team to develop and implement a research and analysis agenda
Conduct academic quality long-term research
Skills and qualifications
Requirements:

Advanced degree in economics or a related field and at least 5 years of post-graduate work
experience.

A working knowledge of one or more commonly used microeconomic survey datasets (such as the
CPS, PSID, or the SIPP) and an ability to conduct statistical analyses of such data (e.g., using SAS,
Stata, or other statistical software).

Solid communication skills-both written and oral-for a variety of audiences.
An ideal candidate would have:

Demonstrated research agenda in one or more living standards issue areas.

In-depth knowledge of economic policy issues that impact low- and moderate-income families.

Management and program development experience.


Experience with media, including print and broadcast.
Fundraising experience in a non-profit/think-tank environment.
To apply
To apply for this position, please send cover letter and resume via email to: researchjob@epi.org. Please
indicate that you are interested in the Living Standards Economist position. They can also be mailed to
Research Dept., Economic Policy Institute, 1333 H St. NW, Suite 300 East; Washington, DC 20005 or faxed
to 202-775-0819. No phone calls please.
Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis until the position is filled.
Pay commensurate with experience. EPI offers an excellent benefit package and is an Equal Opportunity
Employer.
38
Heterodox Conference Papers and Reports and Articles
Sweetening the Pot:
Implicit Subsidies to Corn Sweeteners and the U.S. Obesity Epidemic
By Alicia Harvie and Timothy A. Wise
Policy Brief No. 09-01, February 2009
Pigs, chickens and steers aren’t the only ones in the United States getting fat off a diet of
cheap corn. So are many Americans, according to some analysts, and corn sweeteners
are alleged to be the culprits. The annual per-capita consumption of caloric sweeteners in
the United States has increased by 40 pounds in the last 40 years, and high fructose corn
syrup (HFCS) accounts for 81% of the 83 additional calories the average American
consumes each day from sweeteners alone. Has cheap corn caused an HFCS boom and
contributed to the obesity epidemic?
Perhaps the most prominent writer on the subject is consumer advocate Michael Pollan,
who charges U.S. farm policy with a central role in America’s expanding waistline, citing
the abundance of cheap corn sweeteners in our food. Some recent academic studies
question the validity of the charge, suggesting the link is tenuous at best. GDAE’s Alicia
Harvie and Timothy A. Wise add to this discussion by estimating how much cheaper
HFCS, a critical ingredient in the American diet, was from 1997-2005 because corn
prices fell below corn’s cost of production. In examining the economics behind the
claim, these findings suggest that while Pollan might be overstating the causal link, U.S.
farm policy is doing American diets no favor.
The researchers find that U.S. farm policy effectively lowered corn prices and HFCS
production costs, offering HFCS producers an implicit subsidy of $243 million a year, a
savings of $2.2 billion over the nine-year period, and over $4 billion since 1986. For
soda bottlers, the main consumers of HFCS and among those most heavily implicated in
public health concerns, the savings amounted to nearly $100 million per year, $873
million over the nine-year period, and nearly $1.7 billion since the wholesale adoption of
HFCS by the soda industry in the mid-eighties.
While this may not have reduced soda prices to an extent that would account for rising
consumption, there is little doubt U.S. agricultural policies have indirectly subsidized a
sector that may be contributing to health problems in the United States.
Download Policy Brief:
http://www.ase.tufts.edu/gdae/Pubs/rp/PB09-01SweeteningPotFeb09.pdf
39
For more on GDAE’s “Feeding the Factory Farm” project:
http://www.ase.tufts.edu/gdae/policy_research/BroilerGains.htm
For more on GDAE’s Globalization and Sustainable Development Program:
http://www.ase.tufts.edu/gdae/policy_research/globalization.html
Resources, Rules and International Political Economy:
The Politics of Development in the WTO
By Kenneth C. Shadlen
GDAE Working Paper No. 09-01, January 2009
(also forthcoming as a chapter in WTO and Human Rights: Interdisciplinary
Perspectives, Sarah Joseph, David Kinley and Jeff Waincymer, eds., Edward Elgar,
2009)
This paper by GDAE Senior Research Fellow Kenneth Shadlen examines the
contemporary politics of intellectual property (IP) and investment in the World Trade
Organization (WTO). He explores the underlying and perennial conflicts that pit
developing and developed countries against each other in these two areas and the nature
of the two agreements reached during the Uruguay Round, the Agreement on TradeRelated Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) and the Agreement on TradeRelated Investment Measures (TRIMS). He then analyzes developed countries’ efforts to
push beyond the TRIPS and TRIMS agreements, and, critically, developing countries’
success in forestalling these efforts. Developing countries have “prevailed” in the current
international conflicts over IP and investment not by securing rules that they desire but
rather by preventing the imposition of arrangements that they regard as worse than the
WTO status quo. Shadlen explores the complex political economy of these negotiations.
Download Working Paper:
http://www.ase.tufts.edu/gdae/Pubs/wp/09-01IPinWTOJan09.pdf
For more on GDAE’s Globalization and Sustainable Development Program:
http://www.ase.tufts.edu/gdae/policy_research/globalization.html
Also, please note that Shadlen’s previous GDAE Working Paper 07-05 has been revised
and will be published in the journal Comparative Politics under the title, “The Politics of
Patents and Drugs in Brazil and Mexico: the Industrial Bases of Health Policies.” Due to
copyright restrictions, it is no longer available as a GDAE Working Paper. The new
version can be obtained by request to the author: k.shadlen@lse.ac.uk.
40
THE LEVY ECONOMICS INSTITUTE OF BARD
COLLEGE
L AT E S T N E W S
Februar y 18, 2009
PUBLICATIONS
IN THIS ISSUE
Obama’s Job Creation Promise:
Policy Note 2009/1
Obama’s Job Creation Promise: A Modest
Proposal to Guarantee That He Meets and
Exceeds Expectations
Pavlina R. Tcherneva
A Modest Proposal to
Guarantee That He Meets and
Exceeds Expectations
After the Bust: The Outlook for
Macroeconomics and
Macroeconomic Policy
Postwar Trends in Economic
Job creation is once again at the
forefront of policy action, and President Obama must
be far more audacious in this regard, says Research
Associate Pavlina R. Tcherneva. She proposes an
amendment to the Obama stimulus plan whereby the
government serves as employer of last resort, since a
job guarantee can reduce the unemployment rate
drastically and immediately. This policy represents a
genuine bottom-up approach to the recovery that
offers employment opportunities to all, including
minorities and women, and creates jobs and valuable
work at a much smaller price.
Well-Being in the United States,
1959–2004
Macroeconomic Imbalances in
the United States and Their
Impact on the International
Financial System
Financial Stability: The
Significance and
Distinctiveness of Islamic
Fiscal policy is executed in a manner completely
opposite from what John Maynard Keynes had in mind,
Banking in Malaysia
and we have an opportune moment to set fiscal policy
straight, says Tcherneva. Counting on the private
Long-Term Trends in the Levy
sector to generate the desired job growth is a far too
lengthy and sluggish road to recovery. Moreover, a job
guarantee is entirely consistent with all of the
objectives of Obama’s plan.
>> Read complete text (pdf)
Institute Measure of Economic
Well-Being (LIMEW), United
States, 1959–2004
FEATURED SCHOLAR
41
Public Policy Brief No. 97, 2009
After the Bust: The Outlook for Macroeconomics
and Macroeconomic Policy
Thomas I. Palley
Edward N. Wolff
“Change” was the buzzword of the
U.S. presidential campaign, in response to a political
agenda precipitated by financial turmoil and a global
economic crisis. According to Research Associate
Thomas I. Palley, the neoliberal economic policy
paradigm underlying the current agenda must itself
change if there is to be a successful policy response to
the crisis. However, there are profound political,
intellectual, and sociological obstacles to such change.
The ideology of the economics profession—mainstream
economic theory—remains unreformed, says Palley,
and he warns of a return to failed policies if a deep
crisis is averted. Since Post Keynesians accurately
predicted that the U.S. economy would implode from
within, there is an opportunity for Post Keynesian
economics to replace neoliberalism with a more
successful approach.
>> Read complete text (pdf)
Levy Institute Measure of Economic Well-Being Postwar
Trends in Economic Well-Being in the United
States, 1959–2004
Senior Scholar Edward N. Wolff
heads the Levy Institute’s Distribution
of Income and Wealth program as
well as its ongoing LIMEW research
project. He is a professor of
economics at New York University
and a research associate at the
National Bureau of Economic
Research, and has served as a
consultant to the World Bank, the
United Nations, and other
international organizations.
>> Read more about this
scholar.
QUICK LINKS
Visit Our Website
Research Programs
News and Events
SEARCH LEVY.ORG
[
] [Search]
Advanced Search
Levy RSS feed
Edward N. Wolff, Ajit Zacharias, and Thomas Masterson
42
The Levy Institute Measure of
Economic Well-Being (LIMEW) is a more
comprehensive measure than either gross money
income or extended income because it includes
estimates of public consumption and household
production, as well as the long-run benefits of wealth
ownership. As a result, it provides a picture of
economic well-being in the United States that is very
different from the official measures.
The authors find that median household well-being
grew rather sluggishly over the 1959–2004 period
compared to the annual growth rate of per capita GDP.
They note the crucial role of net government
expenditures, and therefore call for the Obama
administration’s fiscal stimulus package to improve the
broader economic well-being of the poor and the
middle class, while also creating jobs.
>> Read complete text (pdf)
Working Paper No. 554Macroeconomic
Imbalances in
the United States and Their Impact on the
International Financial System
Julia S. Perelstein
This paper breaks new ground in the
analysis of financial instability in the United States. It
shows how instability links with macroeconomic
imbalances and inflation in the U.S. economy, and
43
identifies the key structural features that describe the
dynamics of an international financial system
dependent on the U.S. trade deficit.
Author Julia S. Perelstein accounts for the global
integration of capital markets by analyzing the
relationship between U.S. trade imbalances and global
financial markets. She concludes that the 2007–08
financial crisis was a consequence of the U.S. trade
deficit, that there is global financial dependence on the
United States when dollars are reinvested in U.S.
capital markets (thus creating excess liquidity and
sequential bubbles relating to housing and
commodities), and that U.S. macroeconomic
imbalances cannot be resolved without affecting the
rest of the world.
>> Read complete text (pdf)
Working Paper No. 555Financial
Stability: The
Significance and Distinctiveness of Islamic
Banking in Malaysia
Ewa Karwowski
Islamic banking prohibits interest and
collateral while adhering to the idea that banks should
channel funds toward productive investment. Profit is
generated by primary and secondary modes of Islamic
finance (e.g., profit-sharing arrangements such as
partnerships and equity participation). Its perceived
superiority to conventional banking is derived from its
morality, social welfare dimension, and greater
stability.
The author reveals the dynamic interaction between
the Islamic and non-Islamic economy in Malaysia, and
extends the theories of financialization and excess
capitalization to emerging markets. Using a flow-of-
44
funds approach in line with Hyman P. Minsky’s
methodology, she finds a financial business cycle
where domestic firms have been overcapitalized. She
also finds that Islamic banking contributes to asset
inflation by channeling surplus funds from the
corporate to the household sector.
>> Read complete text (pdf)
Working Paper No. 556Long-Term
Trends in the Levy
Institute Measure of Economic Well-Being
(LIMEW), United States, 1959–2004
Edward N. Wolff, Ajit Zacharias, and Thomas Masterson
This paper forms the basis for three
successive LIMEW reports (the first of these is outlined
above). The motivation to construct the LIMEW in lieu
of relying on the official measures of well-being is to
provide a more comprehensive measure of economic
inequality that will also show the disparities among key
demographic groups.
In addition to the findings in the first report, the
authors show that the LIMEW provides a perspective of
disparities among population subgroups that is
different from the official measures, as well as differing
time trends. For example, according to the LIMEW,
there has been almost continuous improvement in the
relative well-being of the elderly, which were 9 percent
better off than the nonelderly in 2000 because of
greater income from wealth. Moreover, the principle
factor behind the overall increase in inequality between
1959 and 2004 was the rising contribution of income
derived from nonhome wealth.
>> Read complete text (pdf)
45
Heterodox Journals and Newsletters
Volume 52 Number 1 / January - February 2009 of Challenge is now available on the
mesharpe.metapress.com web site at http://mesharpe.metapress.com.
This issue contains:
Letter from the Editor
Jeff Madrick
p. 3
Avoiding Another Meltdown
James Crotty, Gerald Epstein
p. 5
The Economic Crisis and the Developing World: What Next?
Robert Wade, José Antonio Ocampo, Kevin Gallagher
p. 27
The Free Market Versus a Regulating Government
Amitai Etzioni
p. 40
Global Climate Policy and Climate Justice: A Feminist Social Provisioning
Approach
Marilyn Power
p. 47
You Can Eat Your Cake and Have It, Too
Christian Weller
p. 67
46
A Challenge to Washington Think Tanks
Murray Weidenbaum
p. 87
Paul R. Krugman, Recipient of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Economics: An
Appreciation
Robert C. Feenstra
p. 97
Reviews
Pedro Nicolaci da Costa
p. 108
The Revolution of November 4, 2008
Mike Sharpe
p. 113
Feminist Economics: Volume 15 Issue 1
(http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=issue&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_issue_alert
,email) is now available online at informaworld
(http://www.informaworld.com).
This new issue contains the following articles:
Who Uses Paid Domestic Labor in Australia? Choice and Constraint in
Hiring Household Help, Pages 1 - 26
Authors: Janeen Baxter; Belinda Hewitt; Mark Western
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802248989
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=1&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_iss
ue_alert,email
Behind the negotiations: Financial decision-making processes in Spanish
dual-income couples, Pages 27 - 56
Author: Sandra Dema-Moreno
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802620575
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=27&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_is
sue_alert,email
Job Satisfaction, Work Time, and Well-Being Among Married Women in
Japan, Pages 57 - 84
47
Authors: Corinne Boyles; Aiko Shibata
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802629378
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=57&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_is
sue_alert,email
Contextualizing rationality: Mature student carers and higher education
in England, Pages 85 - 111
Authors: Stella González-Arnal; Majella Kilkey
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802528323
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=85&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_is
sue_alert,email
The Challenge of Obtaining Quality Care: Limited Consumer Sovereignty
in Human Services, Pages 113 - 137
Author: Kari H. Eika
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802446658
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=113&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_i
ssue_alert,email
Trading Women's Health and Rights? Trade Liberalization and
Reproductive Health in Developing Economies, Pages 139 - 143
Author: Mariama Williams
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802620583
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=139&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_i
ssue_alert,email
Everywhere/Nowhere: Gender Mainstreaming in Development Agencies, Pages
144 - 147
Author: Shahra Razavi
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802607069
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=144&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_i
ssue_alert,email
Gendering the Knowledge Economy: Comparative Perspectives, Pages 147 151
Author: Lilja Mósesdóttir
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802607036
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=147&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_i
ssue_alert,email
Gender and Social Policy in a Global Context: Uncovering the Gendered
Structure of the Social, Pages 151 - 155
Author: Diane Perrons
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802607044
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=151&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_i
ssue_alert,email
Ethics and the Market: Insights from Social Economics, Pages 155 - 158
Author: Siobhan Austen
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802607051
48
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=155&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_i
ssue_alert,email
Gender, Generation and Poverty: Exploring the ‘Feminisation of Poverty’
in Africa, Asia and Latin America, Pages 158 - 163
Author: Kanchana N. Ruwanpura
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802607960
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=158&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_i
ssue_alert,email
Notes on Contributors, Pages 165 - 167
DOI: 10.1080/13545700802678763
Link: http://www.informaworld.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=13545701&volume=15&issue=1&spage=165&uno_jumptype=alert&uno_alerttype=new_i
ssue_alert,email
Heterodox Books and Book Series
Money and Macrodynamics: Alfred Eichner and Post-Keynesian Economics
Edited by
Marc Lavoie, University of Ottawa
Louis-Philippe Rochon, Laurentian University;
Mario Seccareccia, University of Ottawa
Alfred Eichner's pioneering contributions to Post Keynesian economics offered
significant insights on the way modern economies and institutions actually work.
Published in 1987, his Macrodynamics of Advanced Market Economies contains rich
chapters on dynamics and growth, investment, finance and income distribution, a timely
chapter on the State and fiscal policy, and two analytical chapters on endogenous money
that are years ahead of their time. Featuring chapters by many of Eichner's disciples, this
book celebrates his rich contributions to Post Keynesian economics, and demonstrates
that his work is in many ways as valid today as it was over two decades ago.
49
Selected Contents:
Introduction
About the Authors
Part I. The Link Between Micro and Macro
1. Was Alfred Eichner a System Dynamicist? Michael Radzicki
2. Alfred Eichner's Missing 'Complete Model': A Heterodox Micro-Macro Model of a
Monetary Production Economy, Fred Lee
3. Macro Effects of Investment Decisions, Debt Management and the Corporate Levy,
Elettra Agliardi
4. Pricing and the Financing of Investment: Is There a Macroeconomic Basis for
Eichnerian Microeconomic Analysis? Mario Seccareccia
Part II. Competition and the Globalized World
5. The Macroeconomics of Competition: Stability and Growth Questions, Malcolm
Sawyer and Nina Shapiro
6. The Megacorp in a Global Economy, Matthew Fung
7. Pricing and Profits Under Globalized Competition: A Post - Keynesian Perspective on
U.S. Economic Hegemony, William Milberg
Part III. Credit, Money and Central Banking
8. Eichner's Theory of Endogenous Credit-Money, Robert P. Guttmann
9. Eichner's Monetary Economics: Ahead of Its Time, Marc Lavoie
10. Alfred Eichner, Post-Keynesians, and Money's Endogeneity: Filling in the
Horizontalist Black Box, Louis-Philippe Rochon
ISBN:
978-0-7656-1795-8
Price:
$98.95
Pages:
228
Includes:
Tables, figures, equations, index
Pub. Date:
September 2009
Ontology and Economics
Edited: Edward Fullbrook. Published 2009 by Routledge
The advance paperback version
The new book, Ontology and Economics (the chapter contents are listed below) is
currently available from traditional retailers only in hardback and at 75 pounds sterling.
However, the Cambridge Social Ontology Group has persuaded Routledge to produce a
limited supply of a very nicely produced paperback version, retailing at just 12 pounds
per copy (plus postage, etc). If you are interested in reserving a paperback version contact
50
Emily Hudson (elh58@cam.ac.uk), either by email, or at the address given below. Emily
will indicate postage costs, if relevant, and possible ways of paying (NB for purchasers
from outside the UK, the book can be purchased by bank transfer).
Alternatively, for those who can reach Cambridge the book can be collected from
Emily’s office at the weekly Monday night Realist Workshop.
Please note, there only a limited stock of the books to sell, and more than half have
already gone. So if you do want a reasonably priced paperback version of this book, do
get in touch now.
Emily’s full details are:
Emily Hudson
Faculty of Economics
Austin Robinson Building
Sidgwick Avenue
Cambridge
CB3 9DD
Phone: +44 (0)1223 335211
Email: elh58@cam.ac.uk
FAX (Economics Faculty general office: +44 (0)1223 3354 75
Ontology and Economics: Tony Lawson and his Critics
Content
Edward Fullbrook: Introduction: Lawson’s Reorientation
1a) Bruce Caldwell
Some Comments on Lawson’s Reorienting Economics: Same Facts, Different
Conclusions
1b) Lawson Response
History, Causal Explanation and ‘Basic Economic Reasoning’
2a) Bjørn-Ivar Davidsen
Critical Realism in Economics – a different view
2b) Lawson Response
Underlabouring for Substantive Theorising
3a) John B. Davis
The Nature of Heterodox Economics
51
3b) Lawson Response
Heterodox Economics and Pluralism
4a) Paul Downward, and Andrew Mearman
Reorienting Economics Through Triangulation of Methods
4b) Lawson Response
Triangulation and Social Research
5a) Bernard Guerrien
Irrelevance and Ideology
5b) Lawson Response
The Mainstream Orientation and Ideology
6a) Geoffrey M. Hodgson
On the Problem of Formalism in Economics
6b) Lawson Response
On the Nature and Roles of Formalism in Economics
7a) Bruce R. McFarling
Finding a Critical Pragmatism in Reorienting Economics
7b) Lawson Response
Ontology or Epistemology?
8a) Ruccio, David
(Un)Real Criticism
8b) Lawson Response
Ontology and Postmodernism
9a) Staveren, Irene van
Feminism and Realism – A Contested Relationship
9b) Lawson Response
Feminism, Realism and Essentialism
10a) Vromen, Jack
Conjectural Revisionary Ontology
10b) Lawson Response
Provisionally Grounded Critical Ontology
52
Some Reviews
"Tony Lawson is famous for being the most powerful and effective critic of mainstream economics. His
criticism is made more effective by the fact that he has an alternative conception of economics and indeed
the rest of the social sciences, a conception deriving from his ontological theorising. This volume gives
eleven important writers from a variety of fields and points of view within economics a chance to appraise
Lawson's work; and with his replies the reader gets a deeper sense of Lawson's point of view and
achievement."
John Searle, Slusser Professor of Philosophy, University of California at Berkeley
"Over the past 15 years, Tony Lawson's prosecution of a programme to establish a field of social ontology
has inspired leading post-positivist economists to think anew about the ends, means, and possibilities of
economics as a social science. Much constructive dialogue and debate has been generated and Ontology
and Economics chronicles and extends these probing dialogues. Lawson's fans and critics, and first-timers
looking for a colourful snapshot of the realist movement in contemporary economics, will find this an
immensely rewarding read."
Rob Garnett, Texas Christian University, USA
"This collection of essays between Tony Lawson and his critics is an important contribution to the ongoing
critical discourse on ontology, realism and heterodox economics. While the critics do have their say,
Lawson's responses convincingly demonstrate that his project in social ontology not only makes a significant
contribution to heterodox economics but also is indispensable for its future development."
Frederic S. Lee, Professor of Economics, University of Missouri-Kansas City
"Equilibrium in Economics - Scope and Limits" Edited by Valeria Mosini
Series: Routledge Frontiers of Political Economy List Price: £20.00
(only available online - see link below) Publication Date: 29/01/2009
http://www.routledge.co.uk/books/Equilibrium-in-Economicsisbn9780415493666
General Equilibrium Theory, which became the dominating paradigm after
the Second World War, is founded on the postulated existence,
uniqueness, and stability of equilibrium in economic processes. Since
then, the concept has come under sustained attack from all points of
the heterodox compass, from Austrian economists to Marxists.
The contributions in this book, which include articles from Tony
Lawson, Ivor Grattan-Guinness and Roger Backhouse [and Andy Denis ed], highlight current notions of equilibrium in economics and provide
a guide to understanding the links between economic theory and economic
reality.
Economics Versus Human Rights
By Manuel Couret Branco
53
Series: Routledge Frontiers of Political Economy
http://www.routledge.co.uk/books/Economics-Versus-Human-Rightsisbn9780415470179
List Price: $130.00
Human rights and economics are the concepts that have contributed the most to free
human kind, the former from fear and the latter from need. Consequently, they should be
complementing rather competing. Unfortunately it does not seem to be the case. In this
book Manuel Couret Branco shows how mainstream economics discourse is intrinsically
opposed to the promotion of human rights, especially economic, social and cultural
rights. Considering a variety of issues, this book looks at the conflict between economics
and human rights at a theoretical level; how economics is opposed to the right to work;
how economics, being a science concerned with the provision of goods and services for
commercial purposes, conflicts with the idea of providing those same goods and services
as rights, using as examples the right to water and the right to social security; the
opposition of economics to cultural freedom, supported by the argument that economics
tends to homogenize cultures on the basis of the idea that there is only one best culture to
fulfil economic objectives; how economics contributes to the erosion of the democratic
idea; and, finally, the opposition of economic globalisation to democracy. The main
conclusion of the book is that enhancing human rights in the global economy era
demands a radical transformation of economics and of the economy. This transformation
should be characterised by reinstating the primacy of the person over the economy, by
replacing economics at the service of human dignity. One of the aspects of this
transformation concerns the need for a democratic control of the market. This democratic
control means that people affected by economic decisions should be able to participate in
the making of those decisions. In other words, the book proposes the recognition of
economics as essentially a political science, and, thereby, the rehabilitation of politics
within economics' discourse.
THE KEYNESIAN MULTIPLIER
CLAUDE GNOS AND LOUIS-PHILIPPE ROCHON (EDITORS, ROUTLEDGE)
SECTION ONE
SOME VIEWS ON THE MULTIPLIER
CHAPTER ONE
JOCHEN HARTWIG
Three Views on the Multiplier.
CHAPTER TWO
LUCA FIORITO
54
John Maurice Clark’s Contribution to the Genesis of the Multiplier Analysis:
A note with some related unpublished correspondence.
CHAPTER THREE
HEINRICH BORTIS
The Material and Methodological Significance of the Supermultiplier.
SECTION TWO
CRITICAL INSIGHTS ON THE MULTIPLIER
CHAPTER FOUR
XAVIER BRADLEY
The Investment Multiplier and Income Savings.
CHAPTER FIVE
ALAIN PARGUEZ
The Multiplier and the Principle of Reflux.
CHAPTER SIX
BASIL MOORE
The Demise of the Keynesian Multiplier Revisited.
CHAPTER SEVEN
JEAN-LUC BAILLY
Consumption, Investment and Investment Multiplier.
SECTION THREE
TOWARD A RE-INTERPRETATION OF THE MULTIPLIER
CHAPTER EIGHT
MALCOLM SAWYER
Kalecki and the Multiplier
CHAPTER NINE
LOUIS-PHILIPPE ROCHON
The Keynesian Multiplier: The Monetary Pre-Conditions and the Role of Banks as
Defended by Richard Kahn’s 1931 Paper. A Horizontalist Re-Interpretation
CHAPTER TEN
CLAUDE GNOS
The Multiplier, the Principle of Effective Demand and the Finance Motive: a coherent
framework
ORDER FROM
http://www.routledge.com/books/The-Keynesian-Multiplier-isbn9780415320139
55
Heterodox Book Reviews
Future Directions for Heterodox Economics, ed. by John T. Harvey and Robert F.
Garnett (2007) (Advances in Heterodox Economics, ed. by F.S. Lee and R. Garnett, Vol.
4), Ann Arbor (322 pages, paperback, Univ. of Michigan Pr., ISBN-13: 978-0-47203247-1).
The HEN-IRE-FPH Project for Developing Heterodox Economics and Rethinking
the Economy Through Debate and Dialogue
The Heterodox Economics Newsletter, The International Initiative for Rethinking the
Economy (IRE), and the Charles Leopold Mayer Foundation for the Progress of
Humankind (FPH) (www.fph.ch) have undertaken a joint project to promote the
development of heterodox economics. It involves publishing in the Newsletter reviews,
analytical summaries, or commentary of articles, books, book chapters, theses,
dissertations, government reports, etc. that relate to the following themes: diversity of
economic approaches, regulation of goods and services, currency and finance, and trade
regimes. These themes relate to heterodox economics and to the open and pluralistic
intellectual debates in economics. For further information about the project and queries
about reviewing, contact Fred Lee (leefs@umkc.edu).
Heterodox Graduate Program and PhD Scholarships
56
Heterodox Web Sites and Associations
Queries from Heterodox Economists
I am looking for Canadian, Australian, and British economists interested in
preparing country-specific editions of my new book criticizing free trade. The
edition I have already written is from an American perspective and would need to
be adapted. This would be on a co-author basis and compensated accordingly.
Best Regards,
Ian Fletcher
Adjunct Fellow
US Business & Industry Council
225 Bush St. Suite 1641
San Francisco, CA 94114 USA
415.439.8377 | 415.358.4320 (fax) | 415.238.8145 (cell)
americaneconomicalert.org
ian.fletcher@usbic.net
Heterodox Economics Archive Material
DOCUMENTS IN THE HISTORY OF HETERODOX ECONOMICS
For Your Information
Open Letter on Peer View
Lettera aperta sulla valutazione della ricerca
nelle discipline economiche
Enrico Bellino, Pierangelo Garegnani, Giorgio Lunghini, Sergio Parrinello,
Luigi Pasinetti, Pierluigi Porta, Piero Tani, Gianni Vaggi.
http://www.letteraapertavalutazionericerca.it/
57
CODESRIA (Council for the Development of Social Science Research in
Africa) has got several new grants available for Comparative Research,
National Working Groups, Text Books and a call for papers for
Methodology workshops. CODESRIA is one of the only heterodox social
science body in SSA and it would be great if people could look at the
web page. http://www.codesria.org/training_grants.htm
2009 Monthly Review Press catalogue is now available.
http://www.monthlyreview.org/docs/catalog.pdf
Appel international à tous les universitaires
French universities are on a permanent strike.
http://math.univ-lyon1.fr/appel/spip.php?article2
Domingo, 22 de Febrero de 2009
DEBATE > LA CRISIS CUESTIONA EL SABER ECONOMICO CONVENCIONAL
Crítica a la ortodoxia
La teoría económica dominante es impotente como paradigma explicativo de la realidad
del capitalismo actual. La revista científica Nature postuló la necesidad de una
“revolución científica” en la economía.
Por El Grupo Lujan *
La crisis sistémica mundial dio lugar para que se cuestionara el saber económico, por décadas
58
incuestionado, al punto de tener durante los ‘90 y redivivos aún gurúes neoclásicos de distinta orientación,
pero coincidiendo en un núcleo neoclásico devenido políticamente en “neoliberal”. Recientemente, la
revista científica Nature Nº 455 (octubre/2008) postuló la necesidad de una “revolución científica” en la
economía, reconociendo la incapacidad de los economistas en “prever y evitar las crisis”, en haber asumido
al mercado como ídolo, y acusándolos de hacer propaganda en vez de ciencia.
La importancia de la crítica teórica en la economía suele ser ignorada en el plano de la
aplicación política, ya no por economistas ortodoxos sino por la mayoría de los
considerados heterodoxos. Lo que es permitido cuestionarse –limitadamente– en la
academia, es olímpicamente ignorado a la hora de tomar medidas de política económica.
Un punteo de temas muy cuestionados en la teoría económica actual y que son ignorados:
¿qué posibilidades hay de que la economía deje de mostrar un supuesto pensamiento de
“expectativas racionales” siempre frustradas por la realidad? Veremos rápidamente que,
durante el siglo XX, distintos problemas (puzzles) para la teoría ortodoxa fueron
respondidos por economistas heterodoxos, que fueron olvidados o desplazados de los
manuales (de)formadores de economistas.
Para analizarlo, partiremos de un economista de perfil bajo, Piero Sraffa (1898-1983),
cuya crítica temprana allá por los ‘20, llegado a Cambridge llamado por Keynes, logró
mostrar que, a diferencia de la economía ortodoxa, la oferta y la demanda no servían para
analizar los precios y las cantidades. Toda la simetría generada tras las curvas en forma
de tijeras se volvían lógicamente contradictorias. Como resultado de ello, resolver precios
a los que se compraban y vendían los bienes no implicaba resolver las cantidades de los
mismos transados a dichos precios, y viceversa. Desde entonces, las cantidades quedaron
separadas de los precios, de la misma forma en que resolvían el tema Smith, Ricardo y
Marx.
En los ‘30 aparecen en escena –también en Cambridge, Inglaterra– autores como Kalecki
y Keynes, cuya importancia crítica redundó en establecer que lo que impulsa el
crecimiento de la producción es la demanda efectivamente realizada en el mercado. Es
decir que se genera una posibilidad de llevar la demanda (consumo, gasto público y
exportaciones) a un nivel que se pueda acceder al pleno empleo.
Para los ‘40, y alentado por el esquema keynesiano, Abba Lerner desarrolla los
fundamentos –ya establecidos por Innes, Knapp y el propio Keynes– del dinero como
“Criatura del Estado”: su valor lo da el “poder del Estado” y no la confusión generalizada
de creer que el dinero adquiere su valor de respaldo del oro u otra “reliquia bárbara” que
posea el tesoro de un país. El ejemplo en la realidad deberá esperar a 1971, cuando
Estados Unidos promete que dará un dólar a aquel que le venda un dólar. Así, Estados
Unidos elimina la libre convertibilidad del dólar con el oro. Es el “chartalismo” (dinero
carta) en las teorías monetarias que hacía su debut de fuego. El dólar quedaría como
moneda mundial, con valor hegemónico, pero sin “nada” mercantil detrás que lo
respalde. Simplemente los billetes son certificados de poder. Este resultado a su vez
genera la posibilidad de cuestionar las versiones mercantiles y metalistas del dinero en el
pasado también.
Al mismo tiempo se observa que las economías normalmente se encuentran con una
utilización parcial de la capacidad productiva, oscilando la media mundial alrededor del
70 por ciento, con lo que desde el punto empírico todas las conclusiones neoclásicas que
se basan en el pleno empleo de factores, caducan más allá de las críticas teóricas. Es la
impertinencia de la llamada Ley de Say, que ya Keynes atacara para la coyuntura y que
59
Kalecki y Steindl desarrollaran profusamente.
Para los ‘50, heredados debates del siglo XIX acerca de la medición del capital en valor
se resuelven brillantemente por Sraffa en su “Producción de mercancías por medio de
mercancías” en 1960, en lo que se conoce como “Debate del capital”, en donde el propio
Samuelson finalmente tuvo que sacar bandera blanca y reconocer la derrota teórica. Aquí
se termina de derrumbar toda la teoría neoclásica basada en el marginalismo. Sraffa
demuestra que puede deducir precios sin necesidad de recurrir al aparato marginal, sólo
conociendo las cantidades producidas y consumidas, o excedente físico en la producción,
más una variable distributiva dada (salario o ganancias). No se puede hablar más de una
“cantidad de capital” si antes no se sabe la tasa de ganancia. Es decir que los cambios en
la distribución afectan la “medida” del capital, como ya Ricardo se había encontrado con
el tema con más de un siglo de anticipación.
En el transcurso de los ‘60 y ‘70, elaboraciones de Nicholas Kaldor muestran la
importancia de una variable de demanda en particular para permitir el crecimiento: las
exportaciones. Estas permiten obtener finalmente las divisas para importar los insumos
necesarios para expandir la economía. Continuadores de esta línea, resumidos en los
trabajos de Thirlwall y otros, muestran también que no existe lo que los economistas
ortodoxos denominan “tipo de cambio de equilibrio”, puesto que la actividad de los
Estados otra vez frustra explicaciones basadas en oferta y demanda de divisas, como
también de aquellos otros que creen encontrar en los coeficientes de producción la
expresión de igualación de valores entre mercancías de distintas naciones.
En los ‘80, aspectos teóricos vinculados con las políticas fiscales muestran que los
impuestos cumplen un papel secundario para la distribución del ingreso, y que sólo sirven
para determinar el nivel deseado de circulación monetaria en una economía. Se retoman
trabajos de Abba Lerner en los ‘40, conocidos como “finanzas funcionales” al logro del
pleno empleo, pero en el marco teórico sraffiano en la distribución del ingreso, y con
economías con su utilización de la capacidad en permanente desempleo de recursos, el
gasto público adquiere un peso relevante para el crecimiento, pero ahora descartando la
explicación ortodoxa de pleno empleo de factores, en que la inflación sería causada por
exceso de la demanda.
Si agregamos que se crece liderado por la demanda (Keynes-Kalecki) y que la
distribución del ingreso se debe a cuestiones institucionales y políticas, como se
desprende de Sraffa, tendremos que la actividad del Estado incentivando el gasto público
es la manera de estimular el crecimiento, sin generar por esta causa procesos
inflacionarios. La inflación quedará explicada por el “tironeo” (puja) que hacen los
trabajadores y otros grupos sociales dueños de medios de producción al disputarse el
excedente físico generado. Precios y salarios de mercado que tiran del ingreso en cada
momento.
Lo importante de este breve racconto de resultados es que no se trató de exabruptos de
brillantes economistas que quedaron aislados sino que todos ellos pueden ser
coherentemente articulados para conformar una explicación rigurosa, alternativa a la
dominante. Sólo intereses fanáticos de carácter político-ideológico han llevado al
ostracismo cada aporte enumerado en cada década. No cabe esperar menos ahora para
una alternativa completa a la teoría dominante impotente como paradigma explicativo de
la realidad del capitalismo actual. Con sólo ver lo lejos que se está de tener incorporadas
estas críticas, uno puede sentirse impulsado a avalar la crítica que hace Nature, sólo que
60
“la economía” no es un cuerpo único de teoría y, después de todo, existen economistas y
economistas.
* Fernando H. Azcurra, Alejandro Fiorito, Gustavo A. Murga, Fabián Amico, Pablo G.
Bortz de la Universidad de Luján.
Sitio Revista Circus
Videos Grupo Lujan
Sitio propio de Tango
http://www.geocities.com/alejandrofiorito/revistacircus.html
http://www.youtube.com/grupoLujan
http://www.youtube.com/afiori63
Herbert Hoover Copycat
How the Current Financial Rescue Schemes are Following the Failed
Model of the Hoover Administration
———————
By Ismael Hossein-zadeh
Faced with the financial meltdown of the Great Depression, the Hoover administration
created the Reconstruction Finance Corporation that poured taxpayers’ money into the
coffers of the influential Wall Street banks in an effort to save them from bankruptcy.
Like today’s Bush/Obama administrations, the Hoover administration used the “too-bigto-fail” scare tactic in order to justify the costly looting of the national treasury. All it did,
however, was to simply postpone the day of reckoning: almost all of the banks failed
after nearly three years of extremely costly bailouts schemes.
In a similar fashion, when in the mid- to late-1990s major banks in Japan faced huge
losses following the bursting of the real estate and loan-pushing bubble in that country,
the Japanese government embarked on a costly rescue plan of the troubled banks in the
hope of “creating liquidity” and “revitalizing credit markets.” The results of the bailout
plan have likewise been disastrous, a disaster that has come to be known as “Japan’s lost
decade.”
Despite these painful and costly experiences, the Bush/Obama administrations (along
with the U.S. Congress) are following similarly ruinous solutions that are just as doomed
to fail. This is not because these administrations’ economic policy makers are unaware of
the failed policies of the past. It is rather because they too function under the influence of
the same powerful special interests that doomed the bailout policies of the Hoover and
Japanese governments: the potent banking interests.
Despite its complexity, the fraudulently obfuscated and evaded solution to the currently
crippled financial markets is not due to a lack of expertise or specialized technical knowhow, as often claimed by economic policy makers of the Bush/Obama administrations. It
is rather due to a shameful lack of political will—the solution is primarily political.
61
Specifically, it is due to government’s unwillingness to do what needs to be done: to
remove the smokescreen that is suffocating the financial markets, open the books of the
insolvent mega banks, declare them bankrupt, as they actually are, auction off their
assets, and bring them under public ownership—since taxpayers have already paid for
their net assets many times over.
To put it even more bluntly, the deepening and protraction of the crisis is largely due to
policy makers’ subservience to the interests of Wall Street gamblers—shirking their
responsibility to protect people’s interests.
Saying that the solution to the current financial crisis is simpler than it appears is not
meant to downplay or make light of the problem. It is, rather, to point out that Wall Street
gamblers have made the solution relatively simple by digging their own grave, doomed
themselves to bankruptcy, thereby leaving nationalization as the only logical or viable
solution.
This is no longer simply a radical, leftist or socialist demand. It is now demanded by
many economists and financial experts on purely pragmatic or expediency grounds. For
example, Joseph Stiglitz, the 2001 recipient of Nobel Prize in economics and former
Chief Economist of the World Bank, points out:
“The fact of the matter is, the banks are in very bad shape. The U.S. government
has poured in hundreds of billions of dollars to very little effect. It is very clear
that the banks have failed. American citizens have become majority owners in a
very large number of the major banks. But they have no control. Any system
where there is a separation of ownership and control is a recipe for disaster.
Nationalization is the only answer. These banks are effectively bankrupt.”
Likewise, Mike Whitney, a very incisive Wall Street observer, writes:
“Most people who've been following the financial crisis know what needs to be
done. It's no secret. The insolvent banks have to be nationalized. They have to be
taken over by the FDIC, the shareholders have to be wiped out, bondholders have
to take a haircut, management has to be replaced and the bad assets have to be
written down. There's no point in throwing public money down a rathole just to
keep zombie banks on life support.”
In Europe, which is similarly mired in a huge financial swamp, some policy makers are
now openly calling for “Chapter 11” and/or nationalization solution. For example, in an
article published in the 12 February 2009 edition of Corriere Della Sera, the Italian
Economy Minister Giulio Tremonti calls for a bankruptcy reorganization of the insolvent
financial institutions:
"If the crisis is not a liquidity but an insolvency crisis..., the medicine is not
merging failed banks with other failed banks, it is not in the switch or swap
62
between private and public debt, it is not in creating artificial, additional private
demand. If you are doped, the remedy is not more dope. . . . Saving everything is
a divine mission. If one thinks to save everything, through the last resort of
governments, through public debts, you end up with saving nothing and at the
end, you even lose public budgets.”
As noted earlier, partisans of “bailout-the-banks-at-any-cost” use the “too-big-to-fail”
scare tactic in order to justify trillions of giveaway bailout dollars. Disingenuously used
for nearly 20 months since the financial bubble exploded in mid 2007, this rationale is
now totally discredited, as the fraudulently shifting schemes of rescuing the insolvent
banks have proven both ineffectual and dangerously costly—not only in terms of
hollowing out our national treasury and condemning us to bankruptcy, but also in terms
of further prolonging and deepening of the crisis.
Another bogus rationale for the shifting schemes of the bailout scam, according to its
champions, is that “this is an altogether new and very complicated crisis.” Accordingly,
they claim that “while we are committed to finding a solution, it will take a long time
before we see a market turnaround because it is an unprecedented problem and may,
therefore, involve lots of learning by doing”!
It is hard to say which is worse: (1) this is a sincere argument, that is, they are genuinely
committed to finding a solution based on national interests but have not yet come up with
one; or (2) they are disingenuous, and are deliberately engaged in obfuscating issues and
confusing the people in order to protect the interests of Wall Street financial gamblers at
the expense of national interests.
If they are right in their claim that they are genuinely committed to finding a solution
based on national interests but have not yet found one (after nearly 20 months), then it is
safe to say that they are a bunch of incompetent knotheads who are totally ignorant of the
theoretical foundations and empirical lessons of bank failures and/or bank
nationalizations, and should, therefore, not be at the helm of our economic decisionmaking apparatus. But if their argument is disingenuous, then they are playing politics
with our national interests in order to serve special interests—a case of crime and
punishment.
There are good reasons, however, to believe that the confusion and uncertainty that the
Bush/Obama team of economic experts has created in the financial markets is largely due
to these experts’ misplaced priorities and allegiance, not their “sincere but unsuccessful”
efforts. It is a problem of having some huge elephants in our nation’s financial policymaking room. Mike Whitney aptly calls Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner “a Trojan
Horse for the banking oligarchs”:
“The banking lobby has already set the agenda. All the hoopla about ‘financial
rescue’ is just a smokescreen to hide the fact that the same scofflaws who ripped
off investors for zillions of dollars are back for their next big sting; a quick
vacuuming of the public till to save themselves from bankruptcy. It's a joke.
63
Obama floated into office on a wave of Wall Street campaign contributions and
now it's payback time. Prepare to get fleeced. Geithner is fine-tuning a ‘publicprivate’ partnership for his buddies so they can keep their fiefdom intact while
shifting trillions of dollars of toxic assets onto the people's balance sheet. They've
affixed themselves to Treasury like scabs on a leper. Geithner is ‘their guy,’ a
Trojan horse for the banking oligarchs. He's already admitted that his main goal is
to, ‘keep the banks in private hands.’ That says it all, doesn't it?”
Timothy Geithner, Henry Paulson, Ben Bernanke, Larry Summers, and their cohorts at
the helm of the Bush/Obama financial decision making machine are very smart
individuals. They are among top Wall Street masterminds. The problem is that, at the
core, they are committed, first and foremost, to protecting the interests of Wall Street
financial giants. Indeed, it is safe to say that they are disguised lobbyists of those
financial firms. No matter how hard they try to camouflage their bailout schemes, or how
many different names they use for those schemes, their starting point is always protection
of the insolvent banks.
Just note the fact that while they have changed the name of their bailout scam a number
of times, the primary objective has not changed. The initial bailout plan, which
announced the giving away of $700 billion dollars of taxpayers’ money, was called
Troubled Assets Rescue Plan (TARP).
Half way through TARP, that is, when it became clear that Wall Street gamblers were
simply grabbing TARP money and hoarding it, Bush’s Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson
repackaged the scheme and renamed it as taxpayers’ investment or purchase of “preferred
shares of troubled institutions.” In plain language, this simply means paying “cash for
trash,” as Michael Hudson, former Wall Street economist and Distinguished Research
Professor at University of Missouri (Kansas City), aptly puts it. Furthermore, owning
“preferred shares” of a bank means not having a say or an input in the control or
management of the bank—that is, ownership without control.
As the American people have gradually become aware of and resistant to these fraudulent
rescue plans, the schemers have become more cunning: they have now labeled the latest
version of the bailout scam “private-public” investment partnership.
This “private-public” partnership scheme, as formally announced by the new Treasury
Secretary Timothy Geithner on 10 February 2009, is designed to accomplish two things:
first, to justify the giving away of the remainder of the TARP money; second, to pave the
way for additional bailout giveaways—purportedly to the tune of $2.5 trillion.
Formally, the “private” component in this so-called partnership investment means that
hedge funds, private equity funds, and investment banks would now join the government
in purchasing the toxic assets of the troubled banks. While this is designed to show that
“private participation” in the rescue scheme would diminish the need for public money
and, accordingly, reduce taxpayers’ burden, in reality, it would not; because the projected
private investment is conditioned upon public funding and/or guarantees of that
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investment. In other words, the so-called private participation in the bailout scam is
essentially a roundabout way of public funding of the scam.
To camouflage this pile of dirt, as well as to underhandedly pave the way for asking
additional $2.5 trillion of public money for Wall Street’s zombie banks, was bound to
make the “private-public” partnership scheme vague and unpersuasive. Not surprisingly,
the moment Geithner announced the plan the market stampeded, as investors clearly saw
right through the gaping holes of the Machiavellian plan—by the time Geithner was done
with his press conference, the Dow Jones stocks fell 382 points.
A government “of the people, by the people, for the people” would start from the goal of
finding a solution to the financial crisis that is based on national interests, and then would
look at the implications of such a solution for the insolvent banks. Instead, the
Bush/Obama administrations start from the objective of saving the insolvent banks, and
then look for a “solution” that would accommodate this objective!
When asked why he was selecting an economic team of neoliberal economists who
played critical roles in bringing about the current financial meltdown, President Obama
gave a most bogus, obfuscating and, uncharacteristically stupid, reason: “I have to choose
from the pool of experts who know how financial markets work.”
Yes, Mr. President, they certainly know how Wall Street financial giants work. The
problem is that they are disguised lobbyists of those financial giants.
There is strong evidence that not only does President Obama’s team of economic
advisors owe their professional advancement to the Wall Street cartel of financial firms,
but also the President himself is greatly indebted to the cartel for its behind-the-scene
promotion of his presidential candidacy, and for their generous contributions to his
campaign. Contrary to Barack Obama’s claim that his campaign was not funded by
Washington lobbyists, Evidence shows that the campaign “received over $10 million in
contributions from Wall Street, the largest contributors by far.”
According to Pam Martin, a Wall Street veteran of 21 years and now an investigative
reporter, the top seven donors to Obama’s campaign were Wall Street financial giants.
These seven (in order of money given) were:
“Goldman Sachs, UBS AG, Lehman Brothers, JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup,
Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse. There is also a large hedge fund, Citadel
Investment Group, which is a major source of fee income to Wall Street. There
are five large corporate law firms that are also registered lobbyists; and one is a
corporate law firm that is no longer a registered lobbyist but does legal work for
Wall Street. The cumulative total of these 14 contributors through February 1,
2008, was $2,872,128, and we're still in the primary season.”
Political and/or policy implications for the American people are clear: Wake up before it
is too late.
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If this sounds conceited or condescending, I apologize. I have no doubts that the people
will eventually wake up to the tremors of this brutal economic crisis—as many who have
lost their jobs and their homes already have. The important thing, however, is to wake up
now; to wake up before it is too late—before the rapidly gaping cracks in our economy
turn it into a sinking Titanic.
It is time to wake up now before Wall Street Financial Giants and their government—yes,
it is primarily their government—destroy our economy and bankrupt our nation in their
reckless commitment to rescue financial zombie firms at any price.
There is, however, no reasonable price that can rescue the insolvent Wall Street
gamblers; they have simply accumulated too much bad debt to be bailed out. The only
price seems to be the further hollowing out of our treasury, the mortgaging of our (and
our children’s) future, the worsening and prolonging of the crisis and, ultimately, the
complete breakdown of our economy—and very likely of the entire world.
So, once again, it is time to rise up before it is too late; to rise up and demand (not beg or
appeal to politicians, which has been proven to be futile) people’s rightful ownership of
the insolvent banks, as we have already paid for their net assets many times over.
It is equally important to demand nationalization of the Federal Reserve Bank (just as
central banks are publicly-owned in most countries of the world). There is absolutely no
reason for a private entity (called the Federal Reserve Bank) to be in charge of the
indisputably most important national economic decision-making: creation, control and
management of the nation’s money. It is utterly preposterous for the government to have
granted a private bank the right to print our money, and then borrow it back from the
bank at interest! (Interest payment on national debt is the third largest item, after military
spending and Social Security outlays, in the Federal budget.)
Once the all-important task of money creation is brought under public control, and the
insolvent Wall Street zombie banks are nationalized, the government can then use the
publicly-owned banks and issue loans at reasonable rates, thereby unfreezing credit
markets and rekindling investment and economic activity.
Ismael Hossein-zadeh, author of the recently published The Political Economy of U.S.
Militarism, teaches economics at Drake University, Des Moines, Iowa.
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http://chronicle.com/weekly/v55/i25/25a00103.htm
From the issue dated February 27, 2009
BALANCE OF POWER
Professors' Freedoms
Under Assault in the
Courts
By PETER SCHMIDT
Balance of Power is a series examining new challenges to faculty influence.
Kevin J. Renken learned the limits of his academic freedom the hard way.
As an associate professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Wisconsin at
Milwaukee, Mr. Renken says he felt obliged to speak out about his belief that
administrators there were mishandling a National Science Foundation grant to him and
several colleagues. When the university subsequently reduced his pay and returned the
grant, he sued, alleging illegal retaliation.
Because he is a tenured faculty member, and he viewed the public university's use of
public funds as a matter of clear public interest, Mr. Renken figured his complaints
qualified as legally protected free speech.
Not so, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit declared last September, in one
of several recent court decisions that have raised doubts about the status of academic
freedom at public colleges and universities.
Ruling against Mr. Renken in his lawsuit, a three-judge panel of the Seventh Circuit used
logic that stood his assumptions about his speech rights and academic freedom on their
head.
Mr. Renken's statements about the grants were not legally protected speech, the court
held, precisely because he made them as a public-college professor and they related to his
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job. "In order for a public employee to raise a successful First Amendment claim, he must
have spoken in his capacity as a private citizen and not as an employee," the court said.
At issue in the case was whether public-college professors should be treated any
differently from other public employees. Did the professor — given the traditions of
academic freedom and shared governance — have more freedom to speak about the
running of his academic department than the tax collector does when complaining about
his boss?
Mr. Renken says the outcome of his legal battle "has put a bitter taste in my mouth as a
professor." It also, he says, has left him convinced "this can happen to anybody" working
for a public college.
Several faculty advocates and legal analysts think he is right. Fearing that the federal
courts may be disowning the idea that academic freedom offers the nation's professoriate
a distinct set of First Amendment protections, they have begun sounding the alarm in
articles in law journals and have mounted efforts to try to dissuade judges elsewhere from
issuing similar decisions.
The American Association of University Professors has begun aggressively
monitoring — and looking to wade into — legal battles over faculty speech. The rulings,
says Rachel Levinson, senior counsel at the AAUP, are "narrowing the universe of things
that faculty members can speak about and what they will be protected for."
Robert M. O'Neil, director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free
Expression at the University of Virginia, says such rulings threaten to stifle faculty
members' speech in virtually any area connected to their jobs, including the faculty
governance of their institutions. The federal courts, he says, are beginning to treat tenured
professors "indistinguishably from run-of-the-mill public employees."
Mounting Defenses
Not everyone shares these concerns. Ada Meloy, general counsel at the American
Council on Education — an umbrella organization for colleges and higher-education
associations — says that "the cases, to date, have not created any apparent injustices. ...
Public-college employees do enjoy First Amendment rights, but that should not turn
every case of employee discipline or discharge into a retaliation lawsuit."
The AAUP, not nearly as content with the rulings as Ms. Meloy, has established a panel
of prominent First Amendment scholars to come up with new ways to defend academic
freedom at public colleges. They are looking at innovative legal arguments, as well as
institutional policies or contractual agreements offering speech rights beyond those the
courts might currently recognize. The panel is headed by Mr. O'Neil and includes among
its members Judith C. Areen, a professor of law at Georgetown University; Robert C.
Post, a professor of law at Yale University; and William W. Van Alstyne, a professor of
law at the College of William and Mary. (The panel's efforts are focused almost entirely
68
on public colleges because private colleges have never been bound by the First
Amendment, which limits actions of government, in dealing with their employees.)
In a move that the AAUP is citing as pointing the way for other public colleges, faculty
leaders and administrators in the University of Minnesota system are working to revise its
policies to broadly protect speech related to faculty jobs. Their proposed policy change,
which has yet to be approved by Minnesota's Board of Regents, expands the system's
definition of academic freedom to cover speech "on matters of public concern as well as
on matters related to professional duties and the functioning of the university."
"We feel that faculty governance, which is very important in the running of this
university, requires this protection," says Tom Clayton, a professor of English at the
Twin Cities campus and chairman of the systemwide Faculty Senate's Committee on
Academic Freedom and Tenure. He argues that the recent federal court decisions "make
it difficult for employees to speak frankly without imperiling their position."
Tom Sullivan, the system's provost, says he favors the proposed policy change out of a
belief that "a very important part of our universities — particularly our public
universities — should be transparency," which is lacking where employees do not feel
free to speak their minds.
Picking Precedents
In fighting for his right to speak his mind, Mr. Renken of Wisconsin — without knowing
it — had wandered into an exceptionally unsettled area of constitutional law.
The Supreme Court has held for more than half a century that the First Amendment's
restrictions of government infringement on speech protect academic freedom at public
education institutions. But it has left unanswered a host of key questions like what types
of activities "academic freedom" covers, or whether it affords individual faculty members
speech rights beyond those of other citizens.
"I think the court is actually torn itself about where academic freedom fits," says Alan K.
Chen, a professor of law at the University of Denver. "They have been dancing around
the academic-freedom issue for 50 years and never really have addressed it head-on."
Remarking on the lack of Supreme Court guidance on the matter in a November ruling
upholding the Bush administration's restrictions on academic travel to Cuba, Judge Harry
T. Edwards of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said it
remains unclear "whether academic freedom is a constitutional right at all."
A separate thread of Supreme Court decisions has undermined the speech rights of public
colleges' professors in their roles as public employees, by chipping away at whatever
protections the First Amendment affords public workers in disputes with their managers
over speech. It began with a 1968 ruling, in Pickering v. Board of Education, calling for
the speech rights of public employees to be balanced against the government's need to
69
operate efficiently and provide needed services. In 1983, in Connick v. Myers, the high
court said their speech was only protected when it dealt with matters of public concern. In
a 2006 ruling, Garcetti v. Ceballos, the court said public agencies can discipline their
employees for any speech made in connection with their jobs. (See timeline on Page
A10.)
In the absence of clear guidance as to what speech protections academic freedom
provides, lower courts have been turning to these Supreme Court public-employment
rulings in handling faculty members' claims that public colleges violated their First
Amendment rights. The result has been a spate of decisions letting public colleges
penalize faculty members for statements made in connection with shared governance,
personnel decisions, and other activities related to their jobs.
Threats on the Horizon
Public-college professors received some indication of how little they could count on
academic-freedom protections with a 2000 ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
Fourth Circuit, in Urofsky v. Gilmore.
The case involved a lawsuit by Virginia public-college professors challenging, as an
infringement on academic freedom, a state law prohibiting public employees from using
state-owned computers to view sexually explicit material over the Internet. The lead
plaintiff, Melvin I. Urofsky, was a constitutional historian at Virginia Commonwealth
University who argued that the law hindered his ability to teach students about the
Communications Decency Act.
In their opinion upholding Virginia's law, a majority of Fourth Circuit judges said they
had extensively reviewed the history of academic freedom and concluded that, to the
extent the Supreme Court "has constitutionalized a right of academic freedom at all," it is
only a right possessed by higher-education institutions, not by individuals. The ruling
said professors at public colleges do not have any speech rights beyond those of other
public employees.
No other federal circuit's appeals court has issued a similar decision. Nevertheless,
William E. Thro, a former Virginia solicitor general who is now a lawyer at Christopher
Newport University, argues that Urofsky has the potential to influence courts beyond the
Fourth Circuit, partly because it may represent the lengthiest and most detailed discussion
of individual academic freedom to emerge from a federal appeals court.
Of far greater immediate concern to faculty and free-speech advocates is the fallout from
the Supreme Court's 2006 Garcetti ruling. That case involved a deputy district attorney in
Los Angeles, Richard Ceballos, who challenged disciplinary actions taken against him
for questioning an affidavit issued by his office. Writing for a five-member court
majority, Associate Justice Anthony M. Kennedy said "when public employees make
statements pursuant to their official duties, the employees are not speaking out as citizens
70
for First Amendment purposes, and the Constitution does not insulate their
communications from employer discipline."
In a dissenting opinion, Associate Justice David H. Souter expressed hope the decision
would not jeopardize the speech rights of public-college faculty members who
"necessarily speak and write 'pursuant to official duties.'" The majority responded to his
concern by sidestepping the issue and putting aside the question of whether its logic
"would apply in the same manner to a case involving speech related to scholarship or
teaching."
Drawing the Line
But despite its language explicitly placing speech by academics out of its reach, the
Garcetti decision has been cited by lower courts in three recent decisions involving
public-college professors: the Seventh Circuit's ruling against Mr. Renken; a U.S. District
Court's ruling against a retired professor at the University of California at Irvine, Juan
Hong; and a U.S. District Court's denial of a Delaware State University professor's claim
that he was protected for speech related to a presidential search, student advising, and a
campus event he helped organize.
"The potential harm coming out of that can't be overstated," argues Greg Lukianoff,
president of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, a Washington-based
speech advocacy group.
Leonard M. Niehoff, an adjunct professor at the University of Michigan's law school and
a higher-education lawyer for the Michigan-based firm Butzel Long, says he fears that
more such rulings will have the effect of creating "a serious body of precedent"
influencing how courts around the nation regard academic freedom. He says "the
advocates of academic freedom have not always done a very good job of picking their
fights," and may be hurting their own cause by invoking it too often. "It is possible," he
says, "to argue that the right is so broad that it becomes no right at all."
Lawrence Rosenthal, a professor of law at Chapman University School of Law, says
"most academics are extremely protective of virtually unfettered rights of academics to
say almost anything," which can lead them to defend scholarship that is not just
controversial, but shoddy as well. "I see that as a threat to the university," he says.
But Mr. Post, the Yale law professor who is on the AAUP's academic-freedom panel,
argues in the book Knowledge, Democracy, and the First Amendment, slated for
publication by Yale University Press next year, that the application of Garcetti to publiccollege classroom instruction and scholarship would seriously harm academe and society
as a whole. Professors "would be responsible in their 'official duties' merely for
promulgating the opinions of the governors of the university" and "could no longer serve
the function of identifying and advancing knowledge."
71
The AAUP has decided to draw a line in the sand in the case of Mr. Hong, an emeritus
professor of chemical engineering and materials science who claims he was denied a
merit salary increase in 2004 because he criticized the hiring and promotion decisions
within his department at Irvine and voiced concern about its reliance on part-time
lecturers to teach lower-division classes. Together with the Thomas Jefferson Center, the
AAUP has filed a friend-of-the-court brief on Mr. Hong's behalf and is seeking, with his
consent, to present oral arguments in his behalf in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth
Circuit.
The friend-of-the-court brief argues that the application of the Garcetti ruling to the
speech of college faculty members has the absurd effect of leaving them least protected in
speaking about those subjects that are most central to their jobs, on which they have the
most expertise and are most likely to make statements that benefit society.
The brief says: "Both in practice and in constitutional law, the actual duties of state
university professors implicate — indeed, demand — a broad range of discretion and
autonomy that find no parallel elsewhere in public service."
RECENT LEGAL BATTLES OVER ACADEMIC FREEDOM
Gorum v. Sessoms
In a 2008 ruling, a U.S. District Court held that Delaware State U. was entitled to take
action against a tenured professor for statements connected with a presidential search, the
organization of a campus breakfast, and the advising of students because all were made in
accordance with his official duties.
Urofsky v. Gilmore
The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in 2000 offered the most restrictive view of
academic freedom put forth by judges in decades, in a ruling against a group of publiccollege professors who had challenged a Virginia state law that prohibited them from
viewing pornography on state-owned computers. The court held that individual
professors do not have any First Amendment speech rights beyond those possessed by
other citizens.
Emergency Coalition to Defend Educational Travel v. United States Department of the
Treasury
In upholding restrictions on academic travel to Cuba, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
District of Columbia Circuit held in 2008 that professors are protected only against
government efforts to regulate the content of academic speech, and that content-neutral
restrictions — such as travel bans — are acceptable.
Renken v. Gregory
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The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit held in 2008 that a professor at the U.
of Wisconsin at Milwaukee was acting officially — and thus not covered by the First
Amendment's speech protections — when he lodged complaints about his academic
department's handling of a National Science Foundation grant.
Piggee v. Carl Sandburg College
In a 2006 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit ruled against a parttime instructor of cosmetology at a community college. She had argued that the college
violated her First Amendment rights by taking actions against her for giving a student
religious pamphlets denouncing homosexuality. The court said her academic-freedom
protections did not cover speech having nothing to do with what she was hired to teach.
William P. Harman v. U. of Tennessee at Chattanooga
A lawsuit pending in a Tennessee state court could assume national importance. The
plaintiff, a professor of religious studies, is alleging that the university violated his First
Amendment rights by demoting him as head of an academic department because he
refused to stop accusing a colleague of professional malfeasance and academic fraud.
Hong v. Grant
A U.S. District Court held in 2007 that a professor at the University of California at
Irvine was acting officially — and was thus entitled to First Amendment protections
against actions by his employer — when he made statements connected with the hiring,
promotion, and staffing decisions of his academic department.
SOURCES: Federal and state court documents; Leonard M. Niehoff, "Peculiar Marketplace: Applying
Garcetti v. Cabellos in the Public Higher Education Context," Journal of College and University Law, Vol.
35, No. 1; William E. Thro, "Academic Freedom: Constitutional Myths and Practical Realities," Journal of
Personnel Evaluation in Education, December 2007.
KEY SUPREME COURT RULINGS ON ACADEMIC FREEDOM AT PUBLIC COLLEGES
At public colleges, academic freedom — as a legal
principle — exists at the intersection of two different
lines of Supreme Court rulings. One deals with the
question of whether public colleges and their faculty
members have distinct First Amendment rights
beyond those possessed by ordinary citizens. The
other defines the power the government can exercise
over the speech of its employees to ensure effective
public services. What remains unresolved is how the
court will reconcile such precedents.
Adler v. Board of Education. Justice William O. Douglas
introduces the idea that academic freedom is a First
Amendment right in his dissent in the first of several
Supreme Court decisions dealing with McCarthy-era
restrictions on speech. The court majority, unconvinced by
his argument, upholds a New York law that requires state
employees to take loyalty oaths. The majority says that
teachers have First Amendment rights to speech and
association, but they do not have a right to jobs as teachers.
1952
1957
Sweezy v. New Hampshire. A plurality of justices affirm
73
1967
1968
1978
1978
1983
1990
2003
the importance of academic freedom in a case involving a
University of New Hampshire guest lecturer investigated
for possible subversive activities. The controlling opinion,
by Chief Justice Earl Warren, shows that the court strongly
believes academic freedom affords individual faculty
members at least the same speech rights possessed by other
citizens. It is another opinion in the case, by Justice Felix
Frankfurter, that has the greatest long-term impact on the
court's thinking. Quoting a statement drafted by scholars in
South Africa in response to their government's plans to
racially segregate students, Justice Frankfurter argues that
each university, as an institution, has "four essential
freedoms," those being "to determine for itself on academic
grounds who may teach, what may be taught, how it shall
be taught, and who may be admitted to study."
Keyishian v. Board of Regents. The Supreme Court revisits
and strikes down the same New York law challenged in the
Adler case. Writing for the majority, Justice William J.
Brennan Jr. calls academic freedom "a special concern of
the First Amendment, which does not tolerate laws that cast
a pall of orthodoxy over the classroom."
Pickering v. Board of Education. The court takes a limited
view of the First Amendment rights of public employees in
a case involving a public high-school teacher who had
criticized school-district officials in a letter in the local
newspaper. It overturns the teacher's dismissal on the
grounds he had been exercising rights as a private citizen,
but it makes clear that public employees' rights as citizens
must be balanced against the government's interests as an
employer.
Board of Curators of the University of Missouri v.
Horowitz. The Supreme Court declines to second-guess the
judgment of a university's faculty members and their right
to dismiss a medical student for bad grades.
Regents of the University of California v. Bakke. Citing the
"four essential freedoms" invoked by Justice Frankfurter in
the Sweezy case, Justice Lewis F. Powell Jr. holds that a
public medical school's right to set its own admissions
standards extends to the consideration of minority
applicants' race as a "plus factor." But he also says
academic freedom must be balanced against other
Constitutional rights. The court strikes down the school's
use of race-based admissions quotas as too heavy-handed to
be reconciled with the equal protection clause.
Connick v. Myers. The court holds that the First
Amendment protects the speech of public employees when
that speech involves matters of public concern, but not
when that speech involves personal matters. It sides against
a woman fired from her job as an assistant district attorney
after distributing a questionnaire soliciting her co-workers'
views of their office's transfer policy.
University of Pennsylvania v. EEOC. The court
distinguishes between "direct" and "indirect" infringements
on academic freedom — and says colleges are not protected
from the latter — in holding that the university must
comply with a federal subpoena from the Equal
Employment Opportunity Commission. It says the agency
had not directly infringed on academic freedom in seeking
peer-review materials related to a faculty member's
discrimination complaint.
Grutter v. Bollinger. The court invokes the "four essential
74
freedoms" in upholding the use of race-conscious
admissions by the University of Michigan's law school.
Writing for the majority, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor says
"universities occupy a special niche in our constitutional
tradition" and the court has a tradition of giving deference
to their academic decisions. Lower courts would later reject
the argument that academic freedom gave public colleges
the right to disregard voter-passed bans on affirmativeaction preferences.
Garcetti v. Ceballos. The court holds that the First
Amendment does not preclude the government from taking
2006
action against public employees for speech made pursuant
to their official duties.
SOURCES: Federal court records; "Government as Educator: A New Understanding of First Amendment Protection
of Academic Freedom and Governance," by Judith Areen ("Georgetown Law Journal," forthcoming in April);
"Defending the Ivory Tower: A Twenty-First Century Approach to the Pickering-Connick Doctrine and Public Higher
Education Faculty After Garcetti," by Kevin L. Cope ("Journal of College and University Law," Vol. 33, No. 2); "The
Emerging First Amendment Law of Managerial Prerogative," by Lawrence Rosenthal ("Fordham Law Review,"
October 2008)
Next in this series: The Rise of Adjunct Professors
http://chronicle.com
Section: The Faculty
Volume 55, Issue 25, Page A1
Copyright © 2009 by The Chronicle of Higher Education
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