crisis

As inflation takes its toll on household budgets, asset reserves will make all the difference. How will those who do not possess them manage? There is an urgent need to address the measure of this structural inequality across social classes and age groups.

How can economic policy-makers use economic history as a guide for their deliberations and decisions? Focusing on the case of central banking, this essay argues that the virtue of history is not only to improve economic models and quantitative studies, but to provide a perspective distinct from standard economic reasoning.

Should we blame capitalism for the challenges rich democracies have been facing over the past thirty years—from growing inequality to the rise of populism? According to Torben Iversen, the opposite is true: it was democracy that transformed capitalism to take full advantage of new technologies.

Predictive models in ecology generally assume that capitalism will be maintained. However, as Claire Sagan argues, adapting to the climate crisis requires that we go beyond the capitalist hegemony and renounce the notion of “Anthropocene”.

Though they share the diagnosis of an unprecedented democratic crisis of the European project, our critics remain firmly rooted in a “communitarian” tradition that is no longer able to meet the challenges faced by the government of the euro area.

Seven years have passed since the start of the economic and political crisis in Iceland in 2008. Attempts at reforming the country’s constitution, the heterodox positions it has taken in matters of finance, and the political dynamism of its civil society have certainly aroused curiosity; however, these astonishing facts have yet to draw the interest of political science.

During the eurozone crisis, the European Central Bank (ECB) did not just respond to the risks of financial instability; it also expanded its influence over the economic governance of the European countries and increased its authority in the area of banking supervision. This situation is problematic with regard to the democratic balance of power in Europe.

Eugene White, one of the leading financial historians in the United States, discusses how history can shed light on the current debates about banking regulation. Stressing the difference between 19^th and 20^th century financial crises, he explains the causes of financial crashes, the legacy of the Glass Steagall act, as well as the future of banking.

The American debate over the current crisis offers different attitudes towards history. Analyzing the way historical knowledge has been brought to bear on the crisis, Adam Tooze especially focuses on the analysis put forward by Paul Krugman, and emphasizes the possible contradictions between history and political action.

In our haste to explain away the 2008 crisis, we have tended to put all the blame on bankers and regulators. This simplification, while soothing, might be just as misguided as Germans’ or Austrians’ tendency in the 1920s and 1930s to put the blame on France and Britain for their economic difficulties, or later for World War Two. Crises are the stuff of legend, but we should find other ways to cope with them.

The Icelandic crisis was far more than a typical banking crisis. Historian Ingimundarson sees it also as a transitional justice case with features of truth-telling and demands for government accountability, leading to the indictment of the former Prime Minister for crimes associated with the global financial crisis.

Negotiations between protesters and the governement have failed: the political crisis ignited in Quebec several weeks ago is far from being over. For Professor Christian Nadeau, of Montreal University, much more is at stake here than student tuition fees. As the emergency law passed by Quebec’s provincial government shows, the true object of the conflict is social democracy and the society that goes with it.

On March 2012, 25 EU Member States signed a new treaty to increase coordination between economic policies within the Union, something Germany in particular was keen on. Will this allow them to deal more efficiently with the financial crisis? According to Renaud Dehousse, there are reasons to doubt it.

If we want to adjust to the world the crisis has thrust us in, we will have to stop blaming unemployment on the “French Model.” For economist Philippe Askenazy, we need to shift from a vision of unemployment in terms of job losses, job flows, and business incentives, to the question: “Where does one need jobs in a modern society like France?”

Protectionism does not date from the 1930s; in fact it was invented in the nineteenth century by German, French and American theorists wary of British commercial power. The historian David Todd thinks that this genealogy – which is often ignored – reduces the taint of nationalism that can cling to the idea of protectionism.

The economic crisis that has plagued a great part of the world since 2008 remains baffling as ever, all questions and no answers. Why not start by listing the former, and then imagine what the latter could look like?

In its criticism of the democratic deficit in Spain, has the 15M movement (initiated 15 May 2011 in Spain) challenged Philip Pettit’s theory of republicanism which gave its intellectual authority to Zapatero’s government? The philosopher draws his own conclusions on the movement and the crisis it stems from.

Isaac Martin gives us an account of the American welfare state, at a time when the current economic crisis seems to pave the way for a new New Deal. According to him, however, it is unlikely that the Democrats push back on the welfare reforms of the 1990s: despite their conservative origin, they have made some social and political progress possible.

The unfolding of the financial crisis and our attempts to keep it in check have spawned a new theme of debate: are we witnessing - to the joy of some and the horror of others - the return of the State? Bruno Bernardi wonders whether this is, in fact, an illusion preventing us from identifying the real issues emerging from these current shifts. Is this a further step towards society’s absorption by the market, or a global reconfiguration of our historical and political horizons?