New Books in Economics

In Money and Promises: Seven Deals That Changed the World, the distinguished banker, executive, and historian Paolo Zannoni examines the complex relationship between states and banks that has changed the world. Drawing on in-depth archival research, he explores seven case studies: the republic of Pisa, seventeenth-century Venice, the early years of the Bank of England, imperial Spain, the Kingdom of Naples, the nascent United States during the American Revolution, and Bolshevik Russia in 1917 through 1923. Zannoni also tells the story of how the Continental Congress established the first public bank in North America, exploring the roles of Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and Alexander Hamilton. Spanning many countries, political systems, and historical eras, this book shows that at the heart of these institutions is an intricate exchange of debts and promises.
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In this episode, Joe Williams speaks with Andrew White about how the digital economy is reshaping inequality, work, and the social contract. Drawing on the themes of his book Inequality in the Digital Economy: The Case for a Universal Basic Income (Palgrave Macmillan, 2024), our conversation explores why technological progress has not translated into shared prosperity, how structural features of digital markets concentrate power and wealth, and what this means for the future of work and social policy. We discuss universal basic income as part of a broader attempt to rethink how societies provide security and dignity in an era of automation, and consider what a more sustainable and humane economic model might look like in practice.

Joe Williams website here

- Censorship and Sacralisation of Politics in the Portuguese Press during the Spanish Civil War- "Year X of the National Revolution" — Salazarist Palingenetic Myth in the Diário da Manhã
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In The Making of Modern Corporate Finance: A History of the Ideas and How They Help Build the Wealth of Nations (Columbia Business School Publishing, 2025) Donald Chew profiles key figures in the development of modern corporate finance while emphasizing their counterintuitive lessons for shareholders, companies, and countries. He deals with such questions as: Why did the stagflation of the 1970s prove so painful and protracted? What explains the U.S. stock market’s forty-year run of 12 percent average annual returns? Why is Japan still mired in a decades-long recession? What accounts for the resilience of U.S. stock markets in the wake of COVID and the Fed’s interest rate hikes? Chew argues that answers to these questions lie ideas formulated and tested by finance scholars―notably, an efficient stock market in which prices reflect the long-run values of public companies and a market for corporate control that exerts pressure on management.
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The Highest Exam: How the Gaokao Shapes China (Harvard UP, 2025), provides a detailed, research-driven survey of the gaokao, China's high-stakes college entrance exam. Authors Ruixue Jia and Hongbin Li--past test-takers themselves--show how the exam system shapes schooling, serves state interests, inspires individualistic attitudes, and has lately become a touchstone in US education debates.  

Ruixue Jia is a professor of economics at the School of Global Policy and Strategy at UC San Diego. She also serves as co-director of the China Data Lab, executive secretary of the Association of Comparative Economic Studies (ACES) and co-chair of the China Economic Summer Institute (CESI).

Hongbin Li is the James Liang Chair, Faculty Co-director of the Stanford Center on China's Economy and Institutions, a Senior Fellow of Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR) and Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), Stanford University. 

Interviewer Peter Lorentzen is an associate professor of economics at the University of San Francisco, where he leads the Master's program in International and Development Economics.
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China's approach to digital governance has gained global influence, often evoking Orwellian 'Big Brother' comparisons. Governing Digital China (Cambridge UP, 2025) challenges this perception, arguing that China's approach is radically different in practice. This book explores the logic of popular corporatism, highlighting the bottom-up influences of China's largest platform firms and its citizens. Drawing on extensive fieldwork and nationally representative surveys, the authors track governance of social media and commercial social credit ratings during both the Hu Jintao and Xi Jinping eras. Their findings reveal how Chinese tech companies such as Tencent, Sina, Baidu, and Alibaba, have become consultants and insiders to the state, thus forming a state-company partnership. Meanwhile, citizens voluntarily produce data, incentivizing platform firms to cater to their needs and motivating resistance by platforms. Authors Daniela Stockmann and Ting Luo unveil the intricate mechanisms linking the state, platform firms, and citizens in the digital governance of authoritarian states.

Daniela Stockmann is Director of the Centre for Digital Governance and Professor of Digital Governance at the Hertie School.

Ting Luo is an Associate Professor in Government and Artificial Intelligence at the University of Birmingham.

Interviewer Peter Lorentzen is an associate professor of economics at the University of San Francisco, where he leads the Master's program in International and Development Economics.
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