What’s New
Abstract This thesis makes two unique contributions to the International Political Economy literature. It presents the first comprehensive, empirical investigation of petrodollar accumulation and recycling spanning the period 1980-2021. It also corrects the misconception that …
Abstract As governments and corporations have intensified their efforts to locate, extract, and capitalise oil, gas, and various other biophysical materials, the world has simultaneously witnessed a proliferation of social resistance to these efforts. While …
Abstract In the context of contemporary socio-environmental shifts, the concept of “degrowth” advocates for transforming societies to ensure environmental justice and a well-being for all within planetary boundaries. This PhD thesis, positioned within degrowth studies, …
Originally published at sbhager.com Sandy Brian Hager Reading in the latest FT Weekend about NovoNordisk’s recent moves to corner the market for weight loss drugs, I was reminded of an eye-opening article from Rana Foroohar …
Originally published at notes on cinema James McMahon This paper investigates the timing of labour strikes in Hollywood. The occurrence of strikes, such as the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes in 2023, can make sense when …
Abstract Political economists, both mainstream and Marxist, find it difficult to reconcile the «real» and «financial» appearances of capital. The conventional view is that «real» capital is an objective productive entity; that «finance» merely reflects …
Review of Capital as Power (RECASP)
Manuscripts Don’t Burn SHIMSHON BICHLER and JONATHAN NITZAN September 2023 Keywords censorship, ideology, marxism, neoliberalilsm, peer review, plagiarism Citation Bichler, Shimshon, and Nitzan, Jonathan. 2023. ‘Manuscripts Don’t Burn’. Review of Capital as Power, Vol. 2, …
The Capital as Power Approach An Invited-then-Rejected Interview with Shimshon Bichler and Jonathan Nitzan SHIMSHON BICHLER and JONATHAN NITZAN September 2023 Keywords capital accumulation, capitalization, interview, Marxism, modes of power, stagflation, systemic fear, value theory …
The Business of Strategic Sabotage SHIMSHON BICHLER and JONATHAN NITZAN January 2023 Abstract In a recent article, Nicolas D. Villarreal claims that our empirical analysis of the relation between business power and industrial sabotage in …
Pensions and Power The Political and Market Dynamics of Public Pension Plans ERALD KOLASI June 2022 Abstract This paper uses the theory of ‘capital as power’ to analyze the struggle over public pensions in the …
Costly Efficiencies Healthcare Spending, COVID-19, and the Public/Private Healthcare Debate CHRIS MOURÉ May 2022 Abstract Proponents of private healthcare often claim that the private sector is more ‘efficient’ at delivering healthcare services. This paper tests …
Hype The Capitalist Degree of Induced Participation YURI DI LIBERTO April 2022 Abstract Power is usually considered as either a ‘positive’ or ‘negative’ construct, as in the power to force action versus the power to …
Blog
Originally published at sbhager.com Sandy Brian Hager Reading in the latest FT Weekend about NovoNordisk’s recent moves to corner the market for weight loss drugs, I was reminded of an eye-opening article from Rana Foroohar …
Originally published at notes on cinema James McMahon This paper investigates the timing of labour strikes in Hollywood. The occurrence of strikes, such as the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes in 2023, can make sense when …
Regan Boychuk Author’s Note: John D. Rockefeller Sr. had the last laugh about American anti-trust law and the muck-raking media before descending to Dante’s 9th Circle in May 1937. The oil industry’s center of gravity had …
Originally published at Economics from the Top Down Blair Fix A few months ago I received an intriguing email from researcher and activist Regan Boychuk. For the past 15 years, Boychuk has been studying the …
Originally published at notes on cinema James McMahon Around the time of this post, SAG-AFTRA and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) produced a tentative agreement in their 2023 negotiations. The SAG-AFTRA …
Originally published at pluralistic.net Reproduced under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license Cory Doctorow If you’ve never had a fight over the phrase “intellectual property,” count yourself lucky, you normie, you. In the land of …
Publications
Abstract Political economists, both mainstream and Marxist, find it difficult to reconcile the «real» and «financial» appearances of capital. The conventional view is that «real» capital is an objective productive entity; that «finance» merely reflects …
Abstract This chapter examines the political economy of biopharmaceutical innovation, focusing primarily on vaccines in the Covid-19 pandemic. This analysis aims to make visible the deep entanglements that entrench an extractive and dysfunctional innovation ecosystem, …
Abstract This essay opposes the idea that contemporary critical events like pandemics, global warming, environmental deterioration, et cetera, are to be considered as affecting humanity in a uniform way. Instead of seeing these phenomena like …
Abstract Este artículo intenta sentar las bases para una comprensión de los precios radicalmente diferente a como los entiende el pensamiento económico tradicional. Tras revisar algunos aspectos relevantes de la crítica a la teoría del …
Abstract This paper builds an empirical and theoretical model to analyze how the financial goal of risk reduction changed the insides of Hollywood’s star system. For the moviegoer looking at Hollywood cinema from the outside, …
Abstract Rapid technological change is often touted as a fundamental reality of capitalist societies. It is also presented as concrete evidence for the supposed progressive improvement of material well-being that characterises the capitalist system of …
Working Papers on Capital as Power
Abstract The 2023 war between Hamas and Israel elicits many different explanations. As with previous regional hostilities, here too, the pundits and commentators have numerous overlapping processes to draw on – from the struggle between …
Abstract Israel’s ongoing crisis – or ‘judicial coup’ in popular parlance – has elicited two opposite responses. The first comes from global rating agencies, economists and investment strategists who see Israel’s country risk rising. The …
Abstract This paper is part of a dialogue with Blair Fix on how inflation redistributes income between creditors and workers and the way in which monetary policy affects this process. In his 2023 paper, ‘Inflation! …
Abstract Marxists love to hate the theory of capital as power, or CasP for short. And they have two good reasons. First, CasP criticizes the logical and empirical validity of the labour theory of value …
Abstract This paper builds an empirical and theoretical model to analyze how the financial goal of risk reduction changed the insides of Hollywood’s star system. For the moviegoer looking at Hollywood cinema from the outside, …
Abstract Neoclassical economics is the official scientific underpinning of capitalism as well as its main ideological defence, and according to Keen, it fails in both tasks. Contrary to received opinion, neoclassicism cannot explain capitalism – …
Forum
Jonathan Nitzan
Jiang, Rong. 2008. Wolf Totem. Translated by Howard Goldblatt. New York: Penguin Press. A semi-autobiographical novel about a Chinese student sent during the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s to live as a herder in Inner …
Vladlen Dewan
Vladlen Dewan wrote:Love the idea of compiling movie suggestions related to CasP theory! Citizen Kane and Metropolis are classic picks that definitely touch on some of the theory’s themes. Adding to the list, you might …
Vladlen Dewan
Love the idea of compiling movie suggestions related to CasP theory! Citizen Kane and Metropolis are classic picks that definitely touch on some of the theory’s themes. Adding to the list, you might find “The …
msk0
Thank you, yes; this is the PPI-adjusted manufacturing construction spending, Thank you for your responses.
Jonathan Nitzan
True — but (1) a significant part of this increase is due to input-price inflation, and (2) construction is roughly 4% of U.S. GDP, so its impact on the overall growth trend is limited.
msk0
Yes, the long term trends are downward, but there is a major uptick in manufacturing construction spending not seen in decades;
Bichler & Nitzan Archives
- Rethinking the Political Economy of Environmental Conflict: Lessons from the UK Fracking Controversyon June 6, 2024
Rethinking the Political Economy of Environmental Conflict: Lessons from the UK Fracking Controversy Marshall, Adam Patrick. (2023). Unpublished PhD dissertation. Department of Marketing, International Business and Tourism. Manchester Metropolitan University. (Thesis; English).
- A Tour of the Jevons Paradox: How Energy Efficiency Backfireson May 20, 2024
A Tour of the Jevons Paradox: How Energy Efficiency Backfires Fix, Blair. (2024). Economics from the Top Down. 18 May. pp. 1-32. (Article - Magazine; English).
- Key points on Bichler/Nitzan’s text “Capital as Power”on May 14, 2024
Key points on Bichler/Nitzan’s text “Capital as Power” Szepanski, Achim. (2024). non.copyriot.com. 14 April. pp. 1-10. (Review; English).
- Stocking Up on Wealth . . . Concentrationon March 27, 2024
Stocking Up on Wealth . . . Concentration Fix, Blair. (2024). Real-World Economics Review. No. 107. March. pp. 40-56. (Article - Journal; English).
- Is Bitcoin More Energy Intensive Than Mainstream Finance?on March 27, 2024
Is Bitcoin More Energy Intensive Than Mainstream Finance? Fix, Blair. (2024). Economics from the Top Down. 21 March. pp. 1-25. (Article - Magazine; English).
- The Political Economic Roots of Hollywood Strikes, 1950-2023on March 22, 2024
The Political Economic Roots of Hollywood Strikes, 1950-2023 McMahon, James. (2024). Paper Presented at the Society for Cinema and Media Studies (SCMS) Annual Conference in Boston, March 14-17. (Lecture / Presentation; English).