The Handbook of
the Political Economy of Financial Crises
Edited by Martin H. Wolfson and Gerald A. Epstein
The Great Financial Crisis that began in 2007 reminds us with devastating force that financial instability and crises are endemic to capitalist economies, and that it is only strong and dynamically-changing financial regulations that can keep the damage caused by these crises within bounds. The international financial system and individual national economies, including that of the United States, are suffering from the aftermath of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Economists are struggling to understand the origins and implications of the crisis. The Handbook of the Political Economy of Financial Crises uses a political economy theoretical framework to analyze the crisis.
After an opening chapter that describes the dimensions of the current crisis, the next section provides relevant theoretical frameworks. Subsequent sections apply these theoretical frameworks to analyze the background, dimensions, and implications of the crisis for the world economy. Leading scholars push forward our understanding of how and why our international and domestic economies are susceptible to financial breakdown and what can be done to mitigate this problem in the future.
Review
"Many leading critics of the capitalist financial system address the causes of the recent great financial crisis and measures to reform it. They emphasize the political economy of financial problems, with much analysis grounded in the theoretical framework of Marx, Keynes, and more recently Hyman Minsky. In this book, the contributors appear to strongly agree that there have been enormous costs from abandoning this framework in favor of the neoliberal ideals of efficient markets, maximization of shareholder wealth, and inherently stable markets. Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through professionals."
--CHOICE