Abstract

A crisis that started as an apparent textbook case of how financial and asset markets can spin out of control without adequate public oversight has transmuted in four years into a crisis of irresponsible sovereigns, such that restoring prosperity only requires restraining government spending, unburdening enterprise, and reining in rent-seeking public employees.

Why has this explanatory reversal occurred? Why has the neoliberal approach to financial governance and macroeconomic policy not been repudiated by an economics mainstream whose collective reputation is clearly at stake amidst the warning signs of a looming global depression? And what does this turn of events mean for the future of heterodox economic theory? This seminar aims to address these important questions.