Episodios

  • Angela Jones and Barbara G. Brents, "Sex Work Today: Erotic Labor in the Twenty-First Century" (NYU Press, 2024)

    Angela Jones and Barbara G. Brents, "Sex Work Today: Erotic Labor in the Twenty-First Century" (NYU Press, 2024)
    Oct 5 2025
    A cutting-edge volume on current trends in sex work, from sugar relationships and cyber brothels to financial domination, sex worker activism, and feminist porn Sex is for sale in more ways than ever. It can be bought and sold online, in sex clubs, on the street, and around the world. As with many industries, discrimination, exploitation, and inequality persist in sex work. Yet it also offers autonomy, job satisfaction, and even pleasurable experiences for those involved. Sex Work Today: Erotic Labor in the Twenty-First Century by Dr. Bernadette Barton, Dr. Barbara G. Brents, and Dr. Angela N. Jones explores these contradictions, offering an intimate look at the benefits and challenges of sex work across geographic contexts. Featuring thirty-one original essays by sex workers, advocates, researchers, and activists, Sex Work Today is the first compilation of research on new forms of digital sex such as camming, sugar dating, and AI sex dolls. Providing a lens to understand contemporary labor dynamics and the nature of sex work itself, this collection captures formerly ignored aspects of the sex industry including: fatphobia and disability; transmasculine and nonbinary sex workers; racialized emotional labor in the digital sex industry; high job satisfaction among professional dominatrixes; and sex worker scholars. With federal policies ostensibly aimed at combating sex trafficking–affecting all sex workers–understanding this industry is more vital than ever. Decentering Western, white, cisgender voices, Sex Work Today underscores the global repercussions of these misaligned policies, which make sex work more challenging and less safe, and provides valuable insights for those seeking to shape policies, challenge prejudices, and foster a safer and more equitable world for all. Michael O. Johnston, Ph.D. is a Assistant Professor of Sociology at William Penn University. He is the author of The Social Construction of a Cultural Spectacle: Floatzilla (Lexington Books, 2023) and Community Media Representations of Place and Identity at Tug Fest: Reconstructing the Mississippi River (Lexington Books, 2022). His general area of study is at the intersection of space, behavior, and identity. He is currently conducting research about: escape rooms, the use of urban design in downtown historical neighborhoods of rural communities, and what it means for college students to belong in college and university. To learn more about Michael O. Johnston you can go to his personal website, Google Scholar, Bluesky (@professorjohnst.bsky.social), Twitter (@ProfessorJohnst), or by email (johnstonmo@wmpenn.edu). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics
    Más Menos
    37 m
  • John L. Campbell, "Pay Up!: Conservative Myths about Tax Cuts for the Rich" (Cambridge UP, 2025)

    John L. Campbell, "Pay Up!: Conservative Myths about Tax Cuts for the Rich" (Cambridge UP, 2025)
    Sep 26 2025
    Since the Reagan era, conservatives in the United States have championed cutting taxes, especially for wealthy individuals and corporations, as the best way to achieve economic prosperity. In his new book, Pay Up!: Conservative Myths about Tax Cuts for the Rich (Cambridge UP, 2025) John L. Campbell shows that while these claims are highly influential, they are also wrong. Using historical and cross-national evidence, the book challenges and refutes every justification conservatives have made for tax cuts - that American taxes are too high; they hurt the economy; they facilitate government waste; they constitute an unfair downward redistribution of income; and they threaten individual freedom - and conversely shows that countries can actually benefit from higher taxes, especially when tax increases fall most heavily on those most able to pay them. Through clear prose and a well-reasoned argument, Campbell's book provides an accessible, engaging, and much-needed perspective on the role of taxes in American society. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics
    Más Menos
    35 m
  • J. Doyne Farmer, "Making Sense of Chaos" (Yale UP, 2024)

    J. Doyne Farmer, "Making Sense of Chaos" (Yale UP, 2024)
    Sep 25 2025
    We live in an age of increasing complexity--an era of accelerating technology and global interconnection that holds more promise, and more peril, than any other time in human history. The fossil fuels that have powered global wealth creation now threaten to destroy the world they helped build. Automation and digitization promise prosperity for some, unemployment for others. Financial crises fuel growing inequality, polarization, and the retreat of democracy. At heart, all these problems are rooted in the economy, yet the guidance provided by economic models has often failed. Many books have been written about J. Doyne Farmer and his work, but Making Sense of Chaos (Yale UP, 2024) is the first in his own words. It presents a manifesto for how to do economics better. In this tale of science and ideas, Farmer fuses his profound knowledge and expertise with stories from his life to explain how we can bring a scientific revolution to bear on the economic conundrums facing society. Using big data and ever more powerful computers, we are now able for the first time to apply complex systems science to economic activity, building realistic models of the global economy. The resulting simulations and the emergent behavior we observe form the cornerstone of the science of complexity economics, allowing us to test ideas and make significantly better economic predictions--to better address the hard problems facing the world. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics
    Más Menos
    59 m
  • Edward Fishman, "Chokepoints: American Power in the Age of Economic Warfare" (Portfolio, 2025)

    Edward Fishman, "Chokepoints: American Power in the Age of Economic Warfare" (Portfolio, 2025)
    Sep 23 2025
    “The acme of skill,” Sun Tzu wrote in The Art of War, is not “to win one hundred victories in one hundred battles,” but “to subdue the enemy without fighting.” The author of Chokepoints: American Power in the Age of Economic Warfare (Portfolio, 2025) has devoted much of his career to exploring how economic power can advance this goal. He served on the teams at the U.S. State Department that designed and negotiated Western sanctions against Russia after its 2014 annexation of Crimea, and whose economic pressure campaign against Iran led to a landmark nuclear deal in 2015. Economic warfare is how America fights its most important geopolitical battles today. From thwarting Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons to checking Russian imperialism and China’s bid for world mastery, the United States has reached into its economic arsenal to get the job done. In the process, the world economy has become a battlefield. Its weapons take the form of sanctions, export controls, and investment restrictions. Its commanders are not generals and admirals but lawyers, diplomats, and economists. Its foot soldiers are not brave men and women who volunteer for military service but business executives who seek to maximize profits yet often find they have no option other than to obey Washington’s marching orders. And America’s strength in these battles stems not from its gargantuan defense budget but from its primacy in international finance and technology. This book is about this kind of war. It blends research, analysis, and extensive interviews with more than one hundred of the key players in the events described, highlighting inflection points, interpreting their significance, and pulling back the curtain on the places where economic wars have been fought. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics
    Más Menos
    1 h
  • Xiang Biao and Wu Qi, "Self as Method: Thinking Through China and the World" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022)

    Xiang Biao and Wu Qi, "Self as Method: Thinking Through China and the World" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022)
    Sep 22 2025
    Today I had the pleasure of talking to Professor Xiang Biao on his new book, Self as Method: Thinking Through China and the World, which was originally written and published in Chinese. The English translation has just come out with Palgrave Macmillan. Self as Method provides a manifesto of intellectual activism that counsels China’s young people to think by themselves and for themselves. Consisting of three conversations between Xiang Biao, a social anthropologist, and Wu Qi, a rising journalist, the book probes how China has reached its current stage and how young people can make changes. The Chinese version, 把自己作为方法, was named the “most impactful book of 2021” by Dou4ban4, China’s premier website for rating books, films, and music. The English version, which is entirely Open Access and downloadable for free, was translated by David Ownby. The book reached 157,000 downloads in just over a couple of months. Dr. Suvi Rautio is an anthropologist of China. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics
    Más Menos
    1 h y 40 m
  • Susan Erikson, "Investable! When Pandemic Risk Meets Speculative Finance" (MIT Press, 2025)

    Susan Erikson, "Investable! When Pandemic Risk Meets Speculative Finance" (MIT Press, 2025)
    Sep 20 2025
    Investable! When Pandemic Risk Meets Speculative Finance (MIT Press, 2025) by Dr. Susan Erikson presents a critical and sobering look at how international bankers and investors turn pandemics into investment opportunities, and what we stand to lose when we rely on “innovative finance.” In a world increasingly defined by crisis, bankers and investors behind the scenes turn catastrophes like pandemics into financial securities that can be bought and sold. Offering new insights into how the excesses of capitalism shape pandemic preparedness, Investable! is an ethnography of World Bank bonds designed to solve a big-ticket global health problem by getting international investors to gamble on future crises. In this first book-length treatment of pandemic bonds, award-winning medical anthropologist Dr. Erikson explains how we got here and asks who should hold the responsibility for the terrible things that happen to people, at a time when pandemics are turned into casinos.Dr. Erikson, who traveled over 300,000 miles conducting research for the book, takes readers from the red clay roads of West Africa to the concrete sidewalks of New York City and London’s financial districts, telling the stories of the people, the special interests, and the logics of pandemic bonds. Original, insightful, and extremely timely, Dr. Erikson's lively interdisciplinary exploration tells readers in powerful, vibrant prose about the pitfalls of contemporary global health finance “solutions.” Written for a smart general audience concerned about capitalism’s effect on human health, Investable! will appeal to financiers; politicians; economists; people working in global development, health care, and international affairs; and anyone who wants to better understand how capitalism affects how we care for one another in times of crisis. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics
    Más Menos
    35 m
  • Our Common Future: The Birth of Liberal Environmentalism

    Our Common Future: The Birth of Liberal Environmentalism
    Sep 19 2025
    This is the second episode of Cited Podcast’s new season, Green Dreams. Green Dreams tells stories of radical environmental thinkers and their dreams for our green future. Should we make those dreams reality, or are they actually nightmares? For the rest of the episodes, visit the series page, and subscribe today (Apple, Spotify, RSS). An Albertan oil man and a socialist policy wonk from Saskatchewan banded together to think up “eco-development,” a precursor to today’s sustainable development. This unlikely duo forged a global consensus at the United Nations, effectively codifying the reigning orthodoxy of liberal environmental governance. They told us that capitalism and sustainability are indeed compatible. Might that be the most utopian of all green dreams? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics
    Más Menos
    1 h y 8 m
  • Janick Marina Schaufelbuehl, "Crusading for Globalization: US Multinationals and Their Opponents Since 1945" (U Pennsylvania Press, 2025)

    Janick Marina Schaufelbuehl, "Crusading for Globalization: US Multinationals and Their Opponents Since 1945" (U Pennsylvania Press, 2025)
    Sep 11 2025
    Crusading for Globalization: US Multinationals and Their Opponents Since 1945 (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2025) tells the story of an extraordinarily influential group of business executives at the helms of the largest US multinational corporations and their quest to drive globalization forward over the last eight decades. Janick Marina Schaufelbuehl argues that the spectacular expansion of international investment, trade, and production after 1945 cannot be understood without considering the role played by these corporate globalizers and the organization they created, the US Council (today’s United States Council for International Business). By shaping governmental policy through their congressional lobbying and close connections to successive presidential administrations, US Council members, including executives from General Electric, Coca Cola, and IBM, among others, consistently fought for ever more market deregulation, culminating in the creation of the World Trade Organization in 1995. Crusading for Globalization is also a book about those who opposed the growing might of multinationals. In the years immediately after World War II, resistance came from business protectionists, before labor and policymakers from the Global South joined the effort in the early 1970s. Schaufelbuehl breaks new ground by offering a panorama of this early anti-globalization movement, and by showing how the leaders of multinationals organized to limit its political influence. She also examines continuities between this early movement and the opposition to globalization that emerged at the beginning of the twenty-first century from the left and the populist right and discusses how business responded by promoting corporate social responsibility and voluntary guidelines.The first book to shed light on what caused corporate executives to pursue a pro-globalization agenda and to examine their methods for dealing with their opponents, Crusading for Globalization reveals the historical roots of today’s disparities in wealth and income distribution. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics
    Más Menos
    1 h y 7 m