Economics and Society - Research
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.
Balancing the skills equation
Key issues and challenges for policy and practice
Governments worldwide assume that national competitiveness can be improved by developing workforce skills. This book critically examines this 'high skills' vision at both policy and practice levels. It challenges an oversimplified policy rhetoric that underestimates the complexity of the processes involved in developing a skilled workforce.
Urban competitiveness
Policies for dynamic cities
The factors that make some cities more successful has become an increasingly important policy issue. This book is the first to explore facets of competitiveness in a systematic way that combines theory, evidence and policy implications. Bringing together experts on urban economic performance, it provides a new look at urban competitiveness.
Contemporary Economic Geographies
Inspiring, Critical and Plural Perspectives
Economic geography has a long and varied history, and recent work has pushed the field to diversify even further. This collection takes this agenda forward by showcasing inspiring, critical and plural perspectives. With sections on thought leaders, and future research agendas, it calls for greater openness and inclusivity.
Money for Everyone
Why We Need a Citizen's Income
This much-needed book analyses the social, economic and labour market advantages of a Citizen's Income in the UK. It also contains international comparisons and links with broader issues around the meaning of poverty and inequality, making a valuable contribution to the debate around benefits.
Decolonizing Development
Food, Heritage and Trade in Post-Authoritarian Environments
Combining an analysis of political economy and ecocultural heritage, this book examines post-Soviet Latvia and post-apartheid South Africa in an unusual comparative study of post-authoritarian efforts to decolonize production and trade.
The Politics of Unemployment Policy in Britain
Class Struggle, Labour Market Restructuring and Welfare Reform
Advancing a class-centred approach, this book provides an account of the evolution of social security and employment policy and governance in Britain between 1973 and 2023.
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.
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.
Compassionate Capitalism
Business and Community in Medieval England
It may seem like a recent trend, but the businesses have been practicing “Compassionate Capitalism” for nearly a thousand years. Based on the recently discovered historical documents on Cambridge’s urban property market, this transdisciplinary study presents an invaluable contribution to our knowledge of the early phases of capitalism.
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.
The Marketisation of Welfare-To-Work in Ireland
Governing Activation at the Street-Level
This book offers Ireland’s introduction of a welfare-to-work market as a case study that speaks to wider international debates in social and public policy about the role of market governance in intensifying the turn towards more regulatory and conditional welfare models on the ground.