Economic Sociology
At the End of Property
Patents, Plants and the Crisis of Propertization
This book explores the idea of ownership in the realm of plant breeding, revealing how plants have been legally and physically transformed into property. It highlights the controversial aspects in the process of turning seeds, plants and genes into property and how this endangers the viability of the seed industry.
Austerity Bites 10 Years On
A Journey to the Sharp End of Cuts in the UK
With new commentary, Austerity Bites 10 Years On assesses on the true scale of the damage austerity policies have inflicted on the country’s most vulnerable groups, public institutions and on the wider society, reflecting on where we have been, where we are now and what needs to happen next to undo the damage and avoid the same mistakes again.
Contemporary Economic Geographies
Inspiring, Critical and Plural Perspectives
Crowdfunding and the Democratization of Finance
A unique collaboration between an academic and a practitioner, this book tells the story of money from ancient Athens to the Bitcoin revolution to explain how crowdfunding is the way for people to reclaim the power of their money in pursuit of a fairer and greener society.
Dealing in Uncertainty
Insurance in the Age of Finance
This book conducts an in-depth investigation of one of the largest and longest-established insurance industries in Europe: British life insurance. The author draws on over 40 oral history interviews to trace how the sector is changed since the 1970s, a period characterised by rampant financialisation and neoliberalisation.
Exiting the Factory (Volume 1)
Strikes and Class Formation Beyond the Industrial Sector
Drawing on case studies from Germany, Britain and Spain, this book offers a novel assessment of labour struggles and class formation. Gallas explores key issues around class relations, struggles around waged and unwaged work and labour movements in contemporary capitalism to bring class theory back to labour studies.
Exiting the Factory (Volume 2)
Strikes and Class Formation beyond the Industrial Sector
Drawing on case studies from Germany, Britain and Spain, this book offers a novel assessment of post-industrial action. Gallas explores key issues around union activities, class relations and struggles around unwaged work and brings class theory back to labour studies with a class-sensitive analysis of capitalism.
Games in the Platform Economy
Steam's Tangled Markets
This book examines the evolution of digital platform economies through the lens of online gaming with a unique economic sociology perspective.
Paying particular attention to Valve’s ‘Steam’ platform, the book examines the architecture of this online videogame marketplace and the way it enables new markets and economic transactions.
Global Neoliberal Capitalism and the Alternatives
From Social Democracy to State Capitalisms
This bold new book offers an exhaustive diagnosis of global capitalism. Proposing a novel system of economic and political coordination based on a combination of market socialism and state planning, it offers crucial insights for thinking about alternatives to capitalism.
How to Build a Stock Exchange
The Past, Present and Future of Finance
Exploring the development of stock exchanges, markets and the links with states, in this book Roscoe offers a cautionary tale about the drive of financial markets towards expropriation, capture and exclusion and wonders what the future for finance might be, and how we might get there.
Intersectional Socialism
A Utopia for Radical Interdependence
Drawing on theoretical and empirical studies, this book offers a unique and timely reformulation of socialism adapted to current challenges. It makes explicit the ‘silent utopia’ of intersectionality theory and lays the conceptual groundwork for an emancipatory politics.
Job Insecurity and Life Courses
Drawing from interviews and survey data across the EU and the UK, this in-depth study explores how worker instability is perceived and experienced, and how this “perception” in turn affects individuals’ economic and social situation. Using intersectional analysis, the authors identify groups who are more prone to labour market risks.