Global Slump analyzes the global financial meltdown as the first systemic crisis of the neoliberal stage of capitalism. It argues that—far from having ended—the crisis has ushered in a whole period of worldwide economic and political turbulence. In developing an account of the crisis as rooted in fundamental features of capitalism, Global Slump challenges the view that its source lies in financial deregulation. The book locates the recent meltdown in the intense economic restructuring that marked the recessions of the mid-1970s and early 1980s. Through this lens, it highlights the emergence of new patterns of world inequality and new centers of accumulation, particularly in East Asia, and the profound economic instabilities these produced. Global Slump offers an original account of the “financialization” of the world economy during this period, and explores the intricate connections between international financial markets and new forms of debt and dispossession, particularly in the Global South. Analyzing the massive intervention of the world’s central banks to stave off another Great Depression, Global Slump shows that, while averting a complete meltdown, this intervention also laid the basis for recurring crises for poor and working class people: job loss, increased poverty and inequality, and deep cuts to social programs. The book takes a global view of these processes, exposing the damage inflicted on countries in the Global South, as well as the intensification of racism and attacks on migrant workers. At the same time, Global Slump also traces new patterns of social and political resistance—from housing activism and education struggles, to mass strikes and protests in Martinique, Guadeloupe, France and Puerto Rico—as indicators of the potential for building anti-capitalist opposition to the damage that neoliberal capitalism is inflicting on the lives of millions.

The functioning of the gold standard has recently been at the heart of explanations of the interwar depression, particularly as a result of the research of Professors Barry Eichengreen and Peter Temin. In The World Economy and National Economies in the Interwar Slump the interaction between the gold standard and the Great Depression in seven countries is examined by an international team of economists and economic historians. The editor's introduction critically evaluates the Eichengreen-Temin thesis and Eichengreen and Temin themselves contribute an Afterword.

At the beginning of the 1990's unemployment grew in all industrialized countries: the essays in this collection focus on the causes and cures of this worrying phenomenon. The volume starts by analysing the disparities in the different national experiences and then focusing on European unemployment. This is followed by more theoretical discussions using econometric models. The volume ends with policy recommendations.

A historical and theoretical investigation of the “common storylines” of recent financial crises.

Development Challenges, South-South Solutions is the monthly e-newsletter of the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation in UNDP (www.southerninnovator.org). It has been published every month since 2006. Its sister publication, Southern Innovator magazine, has been published since 2011. Contact the Office to receive a copy of the new global magazine Southern Innovator. Issues 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 are out now and are about innovators in mobile phones and information technology, youth and entrepreneurship, agribusiness and food security, cities and urbanization and waste and recycling. Why not consider sponsoring or advertising in an issue of Southern Innovator? Or work with us on an insert or supplement of interest to our readers? Follow @SouthSouth1.

Exploring in depth the institutions that underpin the global economy, this study provides invaluable insights into why a minimum economic order has endured for so long and why states are unwilling to establish a maximum order, a global safety net for all. The author investigates how debt – a critical component of states’ economic infrastructure – leads to debilitating crises, and how these crises undermine the economic autonomy and political independence of states.

This book explains the causes and consequences of the intersection of two transformative global forces - trade and conflict – since 1500. The nine historical case studies – interspersed over 500 years and spanning the globe - make a major historical contribution to the enduring debate about whether trade makes peace more likely.

In early 2011, the nation was stunned to watch Wisconsin's state capitol in Madison come under sudden and unexpected occupation by union members and their allies. The protests to defend collective bargaining rights were militant and practically unheard of in this era of declining union power. Nearly forty years of neoliberalism and the most severe economic crisis since the Great Depression have battered the labor movement, and workers have been largely complacent in the face of stagnant wages, slashed benefits and services, widening unemployment, and growing inequality. That is, until now.

The hospitality and tourism sector is a large and rapidly expanding industry worldwide, and can rightfully be described as a vehicle of globalisation. Hotels are among the cornerstones of the industry often drawing workers from the most vulnerable segments of multicultural labour markets, accommodating and entertaining tourists and business travelers from around the world. This book explores the organisation of work, worker identities and worker strategies in hotel workplaces, as they are located in heterogeneous labour markets being changed by processes of globalisation. It uses an explicitly geographical approach to understand how different groups of workers experience and respond to challenges in the hospitality industry, and is based on recent theoretical debates and empirical research on hotel workplaces in cities as different as Oslo, Goa, London, Las Vegas and Toronto. A multi-scalar analysis is taken where concrete worker bodies and their physical, emotional and embodied labour are seen in relation to, among other aspects: the regulation of national and regional labour markets, city governments with global city ambitions, and global corporate actors and labour migration patterns. The book sheds light on the hotel workplace as a hierarchical and fragmented social space as well as addressing questions on worker mobility, the fragmentation of work, scales of organisation and how workers can help shape the regulation of their industry. This timely volume brings together contributions from international academics and is valuable reading for all those interested in hospitality, tourism, human geography and globalisation.