Political Economy Forum
June 8, 2021
Recent Tech-centric Political Economy Podcasts
In this episode, Senior Fellow Steven Feldstein of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in the Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program discusses his new book, The Rise of Digital Repression: How Technology is Reshaping Power, Politics, and Resistance, with Forum Affiliate Morgan Wack. The conversation touches on the recent spread and use of digital repression technologies around the world. Rooted in Steven’s own research, the episode and the book detail the real world consequences of extant technologies while debating the impending consequences of AI and big data while providing a look at active forms of resistance being undertaken by governments and civil society actors.
Victor Menaldo speaks to Nicolas Wittstock about a political economy approach to explaining the phenomenon of cancel culture.
Glen Weyl speaks to Forum Fellow Nicolas Wittstock about his work with RadicalXchange and the reform agenda they propose. In his 2018 book with Eric Posner, Glen Weyl suggests radical reforms to private property, the voting system, immigration, antitrust policy, and the way that technology companies handle data. In this podcast, Glen reflects on the motivations behind the reform agenda laid out, the effects that the policy ideas have had thus far, and how his thinking has evolved.
In this episode, Natasha Tusikov discusses the co-edited volume “Power and Authority in Internet Governance: Return of the State?” with Forum fellow Nicolas Wittstock. In this book, the authors discuss challenges arising in different areas of internet regulation.
In this episode, Anton Howes – head of innovation research at The Entrepreneurs Network, discusses the history of invention in Britain with host Nicolas Wittstock. Anton argues that Britons were infected with an “improving mentality” some time in the 15-hundreds. As a result, inventors created networks, shared research, and assisted each other in their efforts to improve anything they could. The results of this mindset shift are still with us today, as we reap the benefits of steady technological improvements, medical breakthroughs, and the resulting prosperity.
Prof. Johnathan Haskel and Forum Fellow Nicolas Wittstock discuss Johnathans’ book “Capitalism without Capital – the rise of the intangible economy” (with Stian Westlake).In it, the authors argue that that business investment in intangible capital – like software, knowledge, networks, patents, and processes – are growing in economic importance. This has crucial consequences, as these economic assets have special properties that make them categorically different from more conventional ones.
In this episode, Research Scholar Dr. Shelby Grossman and Forum Affiliate Morgan Wack discuss Shelby’s work with the Stanford Internet Observatory combatting the global spread of political “influence operations”. They also examine the impact of these operations and a collection of impressive efforts aiming to limit the dissemination of disinformation online.
Prof. Victor Menaldo and Nicolas Wittstock host Roddy Lindsay, CEO of Hustle and opinion columnist at The Information, to discuss the implications of President Trump’s ban from Twitter for free speech on social media.
