New Books in Economics Devika Dutt et al., "Decolonizing Economics: An Introduction" (Polity Press, 2025)
Apr 14, 2026
Ingrid Harvold Kvangraven, economist and co-author of Decolonizing Economics, critiques Eurocentrism in economic thought. She discusses how claims of neutrality hide colonial and racial roots of capitalism. Short takes cover the limits of randomized trials, the neoliberal purge of heterodoxy, the politics behind development and environmental economics, and why representation alone cannot decolonize the discipline.
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Eurocentric History Hides Capitalism’s Global Violence
- Mainstream economics presents a Eurocentric history that naturalizes inequality by treating capitalism as an internal European development.
- Ingrid Parvold Kvangraven explains capitalism arose through dispossession, slavery, and global processes, not just technology or culture.
Book Originated From DECON PhD Network
- The book Decolonizing Economics grew from the authors' PhD networks and the DECON (Diversifying and Decolonizing Economics) network they started.
- Kvangraven recounts Polity Press invited them to write after forming those connections and workshops.
Modeling Choices Depoliticize Economic Theory
- Economics became depoliticized when political economy split into disciplines and neoclassical modeling prioritized individual actors and nationalist units.
- Kvangraven notes methodological individualism and 'mythological nationalism' strip structural power from analysis.
