Capitalism and Its Critics: the Return of Political Economy

The Levy Economics Institute of Bard College invites the Bard community to a fall speaker series beginning with John Cassidy, staff writer at the New Yorker, in discussion with Lucas G​uimarães Pinheiro, Assistant Professor of Politics at Bard College.

The fall speaker series aims to explore the forces shaping our economic lives—from capitalism to financial stability to the policies that hold (or fail to hold) our economy together. Each session features a guest economist, policymaker, author, or researcher whose work sheds light on issues such as financial fragility, structural forces impacting economic resilience, and the public policies foundational to economic democracy. Drawing on the Institute’s long tradition of heterodox and policy-relevant research, the series offers a forum for lively discussion and debate about how our economic system can be made more stable, equitable, and aligned with the public good in democratic societies. Talks are free and open to all Bard College students, faculty, and staff, with time reserved for audience questions.

John Cassidy has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 1995. He writes a regular column about economics and politics, The Financial Page. Over the years, he has also written many longer articles for the magazine, covering subjects ranging from the middle-class squeeze to Karl Marx and globalization to the economics of Hollywood. He is the author of the books Capitalism and Its Critics: A History from the Industrial Revolution to AI, How Markets Fail: The Logic of Economic Calamities, and Dot.Con: How America Lost Its Mind and Money in the Internet Era. Cassidy grew up in Leeds and has degrees from Oxford, Columbia, and NYU. He lives in Brooklyn with his family

Lucas G. Pinheiro is a political theorist and Assistant Professor of Politics at Bard College. His research spans modern and contemporary political thought with a focus on the histories of economic life and capitalism in the Atlantic world. He is finishing a book titled Factories of Modernity: Political Thought in the Capitalist Epoch, which traces the intellectual origins of the factory system across textile workhouses, sugar plantations, luxury manufactories, trading companies, and naval arsenals since the seventeenth century. His writing has appeared in the American Political Science Review, Modern Intellectual History, Political Theory, Perspectives on Politics, and Contemporary Political Theory, among other venues. He holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Chicago and has held fellowships at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and the Political Economy Project at Dartmouth College.