Noam Maggor

How did industrial policy shape American capitalism in the nineteenth century (and beyond)? My article on how the U.S. “escaped the periphery” is now out: journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/72…

Today, Noam Maggor concludes our symposium on @JasonBJackson's *Traders, Speculators, and Captains of Industry.* Although rooted in Indian history, he argues, the book’s thoroughly global-comparative mode of analysis allows it to resonate far beyond South Asia.

"Morality tales about virtuous entrepreneurs or predatory speculators are less descriptions of economic reality than prescriptive efforts to shape it. To label some capitalists as productive and others extractive is way of trying to direct behavior toward socially desired ends."

Today, @JasonBJackson kicks off a symposium on his new book, *Traders, Speculators, and Captains of Industry: How Capitalist Legitimacy Shaped Foreign Investment Policy in India.* Economic policymaking, he argues, is best seen as a state-led project of moral ordering of capital.

@nikhil_palsingh @nytopinion The Fed is a federal corporation and a creature of Congress – not an administrative agency under the control of the Executive. Caitlin Tully's piece offers a historically informed way out of the current stalemate over central bank “independence": theatlantic.com/ideas/2025/11/…

The Supreme Court’s incoherence is showing. Has the Supreme Court Backed Itself Into a Corner? nytimes.com/2026/01/21/opi… via @NYTOpinion

Historian Sean Irving on the lost ideals of republicanism, republican political thought terrified monarchies, played a major role in ending slavery, and was built around the ideal that citizens must exercise economic as well as political power aeon.co/essays/the-wes…

In the new RAH, @NMaggor, Nicolas Barreyre, Rosanne Currarino, @EmmaTeit and I look back at Richard Bensel's monumental Political Economy of American Industrialization after 25 years.

NEW ISSUE OUT NOW Reviews in American History Volume 53, Number 4, December 2025 tinyurl.com/459y3294   CONTRIBUTORS
 Amy J. Rutenberg, Kathryn Olivarius, Judith Giesberg, Carl J. Guarneri, Anthony Harkins, Christopher Agee, Van Gosse, Ariel Ron, Rosanne Currarino, and more

FDR's second bill of rights made its goals for delivering tangle benefits to voters concrete and specific. Saying an abstract noun stands for tangible benefits is a way to avoid stating any actual values or goals or the possibility of any sort of democratic discussion.

Last minute stocking stuffer: retrospective forum on Richard Bensel's Political Economy of American Industrialization w/essays by Rosanne Currarino, @EmmaTeit, Nicolas Barreyre, @NMaggor and me and a reply from Bensel himself. Give your loved ones the gift of political economy!

My book “Traders, Speculators and Captains of Industry: How Capitalist Legitimacy Shaped Foreign Investment Policy in India” published by @Harvard_Press is out! hup.harvard.edu/books/97806742…

@RonenMandelkern @arlozforum גם באירופה אומרים את זה!

התגובה המרכזית של נציגת אגף תקציבים לדברים שלי בכנס @arlozforum הייתה ״פה זה לא שוודיה״. נזכרתי שבתואר השני שלי בהרצאת אורח, ראש אג״ת דאז קובי הבר הסביר לנו למה חייבים תמיד לקצץ במילים ״פה זה לא אירופה״. ללמדנו שאגף תקציבים ממחזרים לא רק מדיניות מזיקות אלא גם מנטרות מטופשות…

Capitalism has arrived! And it needs no modifiers. Can’t wait to dig into this monumental history. Le capitalisme est arrivé ! Et il n’a besoin d’aucun qualificatif. Hâte de plonger dans cette histoire monumentale. @Sven_Beckert @PenguinUKBooks @penguinusa

Today is a big day for me: After years of work in dusty archives around the world and unending hours on the computer, Capitalism: A Global History is out. And the book just received the best birthday gift: It became one of the NYT's 100 notable books. #link-4729bcd2" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">nytimes.com/2025/11/24/boo…

The soft power of United States has sometimes obscured that slavery was foundational to the settlement of the Western hemisphere, and how it was different in Brazil and South America, more urban, more Catholic, more African. @araujohistorian aeon.co/essays/way-dow… via @aeonmag

Forthcoming: The Moving Word How the West African and Caribbean Press Shaped Black Political Thought, 1935–1960 By Leslie James hup.harvard.edu/books/97806742…

We are delighted to announce the forthcoming publication of a new volume in the Stanford Ottoman World Series: Kristen Alff, Violent Interests: Capitalism and Social Transformation in the Eastern Mediterranean. Violent Interests explores how Beiruti entrepreneurs’ ties to Western European capital shaped the emergence of modern capitalism in the Eastern Mediterranean. Kristen Alff traces how land, labor, and gender relations were reorganized, showing how war—especially World War I—accelerated the subjugation of social life to capital accumulation. The result is a striking account of how Beirut’s late Ottoman companies transformed the region long after both they and the empire disappeared. sup.org/books/middle-e…

Die Fed stabilisierte lange die neoliberale Ordnung. Doch sie wurde einst von unten geschaffen und könnte heute progressiver Politik dienen, schreiben @AntonJaegermm und @NMaggor surplusmagazin.de/fed-zentralban…