Financial crises and the nature of capitalist money

This volume is a debate about a sociology and economics of money: a form of positive trespassing. It is unique in being written by scholars of both disciplines committed to this mutual venture and in starting from the original groundwork laid by Geoffrey Ingham.The contributors look critically at money's institutions and the meanings and history of money-creation and show the cross cutting purposes or incommensurable sides of money and its crises. These arise from severe tensions and social conflicts about the production of money and its many purposes. We demonstrate the centrality of money to capitalism and consider social disorders since the 2007 crisis, which marks the timeliness and need for dialogue. Both disciplines have far too much to offer to remain in the former, damaging standoff. While we are thankful to see a possible diminution of this split, remnants are maintained by mainstream economic and sociological theorists who, after all the crises of the past 30 years, and many before, still hold to an argument that money really does not 'matter'. We suggest, to many different and interested audiences, that since money is a promise, understanding this social relation must be a joint though plural task between economics and sociology at the very least.

This volume is a debate about a sociology and economics of money: a form of positive trespassing. It is unique in being written by scholars of both disciplines committed to this mutual venture and in starting from the original groundwork laid by Geoffrey Ingham. The contributors look critically at money's institutions and the meanings and history of money-creation and show the cross cutting purposes or incommensurable sides of money and its crises. These arise from severe tensions and social conflicts about the production of money and its many purposes. We demonstrate the centrality of money to capitalism and consider social disorders since the 2007 crisis, which marks the timeliness and need for dialogue. Both disciplines have far too much to offer to remain in the former, damaging standoff. While we are thankful to see a possible diminution of this split, remnants are maintained by mainstream economic and sociological theorists who, after all the crises of the past 30 years, and many before, still hold to an argument that money really does not 'matter'. We suggest, to many different and interested audiences, that since money is a promise, understanding this social relation must be a joint though plural task between economics and sociology at the very least.

Preface; R. Swedeberg 1. Introduction to Positive Trespassing'; J. F. Pixley and G. C. Harcourt 2. Requirements of a Philosophy of Money and Finance; J. Smithin 3. Ingham and Keynes on the Nature of Money; M. Hayes 4. Money: Instrument of Exchange or Social Institution of Value? A. Orlean and C. Goodhart 5. A New Meme for Money, R. Wray 6. Monetary Surrogates and Money's Dual Nature; D. Woodruff 7. Reforming Money to Exit the Crisis: Examples of Non-capitalist Monetary Systems in Theory and Practice; L. Fantacci 8. The Current Banking Crisis in the UK: an Evolutionary View; V. Chick 9. Money and the State; M. Sawyer 10. The Real (Social) Experience of Monetary Policy; S. Dow 11. Economic Policies of the New Consensus Macroeconomics: A Critical Appraisal; P. Arestis 12. A Socio-economic Systems Model of the 2007+ Global Financial Crisis; T.R. Burns, A. Martinelli and P. Deville 13. Credit Money, Fiat Money and Currency Pyramids: Critical Reflections on the Financial Crisis and Sovereign Debt, B. Jessop 14. Geoffrey Ingham's Theory, Money's Conflicts and Social Change; J. Pixley 15. Reflections on the Two Disciplines' Mutual Work; G. Ingham