The Welfare State Revisited
Authors: José Antonio Ocampo, Joseph E. Stiglitz – Columbia University
The welfare state has been under attack for decades, but now more than ever there is a need for strong social protection systems—the best tools we have to combat inequality, support social justice, and even improve economic performance. In this book, José Antonio Ocampo and Joseph E. Stiglitz bring together distinguished contributors to examine the global variations of social programs and make the case for a redesigned twenty-first-century welfare state.
A most important volume at a time when the negative political consequences and resulting economic damage of a poorly functioning welfare state are so evidently apparent in several major countries. This book shows how the welfare state should be strengthened and adapted to address the mounting economic, social, and environmental challenges of today’s and, most crucially, tomorrow’s world.
François Bourguignon, Paris School of Economics
Europeanisation and Renationalisation – Learning from Crises for Innovation and Development
Authors: Ulrike Liebert, Anne Jenichen – University of Bremen, Aston University
The book explores how the European Union and its members have been renegotiating Europeanization and renationalization in response to the multiple crises they have faced in recent years. The authors highlight varying understandings of “crisis” in different national and supranational policy and institutional contexts. They show how in some cases these have challenged the legitimacy of European Union norms and institutions and even triggered disintegration while in others these crises have served as sources of inspiration for European social innovation and political development.
Termites of the State Why Complexity Leads to Inequality
Author: Vito Tanzi – IMF
Tanzi connects the biggest issues of the modern world including extreme gaps in income distribution, increasing complexity of government actions and regulations, and asymmetry of access to information and to political influence between the elite and the rest of society.
This book is a fascinating discussion of why government may sometimes aggravate the problems which they are set to solve. It offers a wealth of examples from New Zealand to the US to Italy, from current events to the Great Depression. Read it if you want to reflect upon the role of the public sector in modern economies. You will learn a lot from Vito Tanzi.
Alberto Alesina, Harvard University
Alternative Approaches in Macroeconomics – Essays in Honour of John McCombie
Author: Philip Arestis – University of Cambridge
This book honours Professor John McCombie’s retirement by exploring a variety of themes, theories and debates in non-orthodox macroeconomics. With contributions from leading scholars, the book covers diverse ground in economic thought, policy, empirical work and modelling. It demonstrates ongoing presumptions and asks probing questions of topical questions from the increase of income equality to the international variation of productivity investment. This collection will appeal to academics and students with an interest in the history of macroeconomic thinking.
