Possible Futures Series

A three volume analysis of the global economic crisis

The first three volumes of the series, available for purchase as a set now!
The Possible Futures Series gathers together leading social
scientists to address the significance of the global economic crisis in a
series of short, accessible books. Each volume takes on the past,
present, and future of this crisis suggesting that it has an informative
history, that the consequences could be much more basic than the stock
market declines, and that only fundamental changes -- not fiscal
band-aids -- can head off future repetitions.
CONTRIBUTORS INCLUDE: Immanuel Wallerstein, David Harvey, Saskia
Sassen, James Kenneth Galbraith, Manuel Castells, Nancy Fraser, Rogers
Brubaker, David Held, Mary Kaldor, Vadim Volkov, Giovanni Arrighi,
Beverly Silver, and Fernando Coronil.
Volume I, Business as Usual
The Roots of the Global Financial Meltdown
Edited by Craig Calhoun and Georgi Derluguian
Much more basic than the result of a few financial traders cheating the system, Business as Usual
shows how the current financial crisis was made possible by both
neoliberal financial reforms and a massive turning away from
manufacturing things of value to make profits from trading financial
assets. In original essays, the contributors establish how the Great
Recession is related to crises of the past, and yet why this meltdown
was different. The volume concludes by asking whether the crisis --
despite its severity -- contains seeds of a new global economy, what
role the US will play, and whether China or other countries will rise to
global leadership.

Volume II, The Deepening Crisis
Governance Challenges after Neoliberalism
Edited by Craig Calhoun and Georgi Derluguian
Response to financial meltdown is entangled with basic challenges to
global governance. Environment, global security, ethnicity and
nationalism are all global issues today. Focusing on the political and
social dimensions of the crisis, contributors examine changes in
relationships between the world's richer and poorer countries, efforts
to strengthen global institutions, and dificulties facing states trying
to create stability...read more...