New Books in Economic and Business History

New Books Network

Episodes

Mentioned books

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Mar 20, 2026 • 1h 10min

Paul Kohlbry, "Plots and Deeds: Agrarian Annihilation and the Fight for Land Justice in Palestine" (Stanford UP, 2026)

Paul Kohlbry, Assistant Professor of Global Studies and anthropologist of agrarian life, discusses land as home, property, territory, and homeland. He traces agrarian annihilation in the West Bank, legal and market pressures on peasant farming, ruined land and reclamation projects, property as both tool of conquest and defense, and gendered inheritance and land-for-tillers claims.
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Mar 18, 2026 • 44min

Lisa Nakamura, "The Inattention Economy: How Women of Color Built the Internet" (U Minnesota Press, 2026)

Lisa Nakamura, professor and scholar of race, gender, and digital media, recovers the overlooked labor of women of color who made the internet work. She traces three eras from Navajo semiconductor workers to MySpace influencers to Black VR creators. Topics include digital extraction, the invisibility of care work, and calls for recognition and material repair.
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Mar 17, 2026 • 1h 2min

Abe Walker, "Reassembling the UAW: Insurgency, Contention, and the Struggle for Unionism in the American South" (Temple UP, 2026)

Abe Walker, assistant professor of sociology and author of Reassembling the UAW, studies labor organizing and the UAW’s Chattanooga campaigns. He traces the decade-long struggle to unionize Volkswagen, reviews strategic failures and the rise of insurgent rank-and-file tactics, and explains how shifts in strategy, scandals, and worker-led mobilization produced a 2024 breakthrough.
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Mar 16, 2026 • 1h 7min

César A. Hidalgo, "The Infinite Alphabet: And the Laws of Knowledge" (Allen Lane, 2026)

César A. Hidalgo, physicist and founder of the Center for Collective Learning, explores the laws governing how knowledge grows and spreads. He tells vivid stories from failed planned cities to China’s rise. He outlines three principles—time, space, and value—and discusses specialization, cross-disciplinary translation, policy choices, and how AI reshapes creative work.
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Mar 16, 2026 • 44min

Eurie Dahn, "Snack" (Bloomsbury, 2026)

Eurie Dahn, scholar of Black American periodicals and literature and author of Snack (Bloomsbury, 2026). She traces how snacks became mainstream through packaging, corporate tactics, and marketing. Short takes explore Flamin' Hot Cheetos, kid-focused products, immigrant snack cultures, and how snacks carry meanings of pleasure, memory, race, and diet culture.
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Mar 16, 2026 • 16min

Entrepreneurial Work Ethic

A deep dive into the rise of the entrepreneurial work ethic and how it replaced older ideas of industriousness. Conversations trace its roots from success literature to business schools and the gig economy. The talk examines who the ethic serves, why bureaucrats are cast as villains, and how the push to “make your own job” reshapes labor and hope.
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Mar 14, 2026 • 1h 8min

Pepper Culpepper and Taeku Lee, "Billionaire Backlash: The Age of Corporate Scandal and How it Could Save Democracy" (Bloomsbury, 2026) 

Pepper Culpepper, a political scientist who studies corporate power and regulation, explores how major corporate scandals can trigger political change. He discusses vivid hearings, high-profile cases like Cambridge Analytica and VW, how latent public anger becomes reform, differences between democratic and authoritarian responses, and why scandals may shape future regulation on tech, AI, and climate.
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8 snips
Mar 14, 2026 • 33min

Michael Kimmel, "Playmakers: The Jewish Entrepreneurs Who Created the Toy Industry in America" (W. W. Norton & Co, 2026)

Michael Kimmel, Sociologist and author of Playmakers, traces how first-generation Jewish entrepreneurs built America’s toy industry. He recounts the teddy bear’s origins, uncovers a hidden Jewish toymaking network, and links immigrant marginality to imaginative childhood culture. He also explores comic creators, child-rearing ideas, and the lasting influence of those firms on modern play.
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8 snips
Mar 14, 2026 • 45min

Marianna Dudley, "Electric Wind: An Energy History of Modern Britain by Marianna Dudley" (Manchester UP, 2025)

Marianna Dudley, Senior Lecturer in Environmental Humanities at the University of Bristol and author of Electric Wind, traces Britain’s long love affair with wind. She discusses early wind-electric experiments, meteorology and Orkney tests, 1970s counterculture sustaining wind expertise, privatization’s role in commercial turbines, offshore complexities, and community ownership as an alternative model.
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Mar 13, 2026 • 1h 6min

Jessica Ann Levy, "Black Power, Inc.: Corporate America and the Rise of Multinational Empowerment Politics" (U Pennsylvania Press, 2026)

Jessica Ann Levy, historian of race, capitalism, and transnational politics, explores how corporate America shaped Black empowerment from U.S. cities to Africa. She traces the movement’s roots, contrasts entrepreneurial empowerment with radical Black Power, and follows debates over divestment, corporate partnerships, and empowerment programs across decades.

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