Mike Norman Economics

Last summer, researchers at the International Monetary Fund settled a long and bitter debate over “neoliberalism”: they admitted it exists. Three senior economists at the IMF, an organisation not known for its incaution, published a paper questioning the benefits of neoliberalism. In so doing, they helped put to rest the idea that the word is nothing more than a political slur, or a term without any analytic power. The paper gently called out a “neoliberal agenda” for pushing deregulation...

There is a recurring theme in public discussions, seemingly embraced by everyone from Steve Bannon to columnists at the New York Times and Washington Post, that we should use protectionist measures to try to keep China from overtaking the U.S. as the world’s leading economic power. This effort is both incredibly wrongheaded and doomed to failure… Beat the PressUsing Protectionism to Try to Keep China DownDean Baker | Co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington,...

But what should be more troubling to Antifa is that its strategy of participating in violence provides a unique opening for right-wing extremists. We are hearing more and more about Antifa not because its anti-fascist message is being disseminated more effectively. Instead we are hearing about it as the bogeyman of white supremacists, the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis, and other far-right groups. Antifa is, in this context, the violent provocateur of the alt-right. Unless and until the left...

Important. I think Noah has this right. Fit the tool to the job, rather than the job to the tool. Aristotle defined speculative knowledge in terms of causal explanation. This definition stuck although Aristotle's analysis of causality did not. In the Posterior Analytics, Aristotle places the following crucial condition on proper knowledge: we think we have knowledge of a thing only when we have grasped its cause (APost. 71 b 9–11. Cf. APost. 94 a 20). That proper knowledge is knowledge...

Professor Bill Mitchell – a major proponent of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) – will attend a Labour Conference fringe event this September, it’s a rare opportunity progressives must seize.… Through the mass misinformation that is the neoliberal doctrine, the elites created a set of economic rules which presents them and only them as the indispensable saviours of society, and thus the only entity that must directly benefit from economic policy. They then dressed this fantasy as common sense,...

It has never been more important to knowledge the history of fascism and neofacism in America. David Montadel is assistant professor of international history at the London School of Economics and Political Science. America is currently experiencing a wave of increasingly aggressive far-right and neo-fascist activism. Observers have routinely considered fascism an ideology alien to American society. Yet it has deeper roots in American history than most of us have been willing to...

Trump’s embattled strategist phones me, unbidden, to opine on China, Korea, and his enemies in the administration. Great article.The American ProspectSteve Bannon, Unrepentant Robert KuttnerIt gets better. Bannon thought this was off the record.Raw Story‘Leaker’ Bannon ‘never intended’ for free-wheeling interview to be on record: report Elizabeth Preza

Indigenous communities in Brazil have scored a major victory, as the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in their favor in a conflict over the Xingu Indigenous Park, in the state of Mato Grosso, and the Indigenous reserves of Nambikwara and Parecis. teleSURtv.netBrazil's Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Indigenous ClaimteleSUR / md-IB-cl

This is interesting post. It reflects a key strain of thought at the time of the craziness over Vietnam that led to the countercultural revolution, communalism, the underground economy, etc. Most people that grew up after that period are unaware of the profound shift that took place in American culture from mid-Sixties (seeded by the Beat Generation of the late Fifties) to the mid-Seventies. The transition was complete by the late Seventies and America set off on another generational round...

The Alt Right is not going to be happy with Steve Bannon calling the white nationalist protesters clowns and losers. He is correct that Democrats have a tendency to overplay their hand in using identity politics, but they smell blood here. The good thing is that America is finally having to deal with its demons.The HillBannon: I want Democrats to talk about racism every day John Bowden Meanwhile, Barack Obama hit a homer with this tweet. The GuardianObama's anti-racism tweet...