French Economist Daniel Cohen
French economist Daniel Cohen’s books on today’s economy deserve wide readership among policy makers, activists and intellectuals.
Hardly a household name or common feature of the American talk show circuit, (or is the proper word “circus”?), economist Daniel Cohen has authored a series of readable, challenging and illuminating works. He is a master of the book-long essay and is big on irony.
Cohen’s core arguments and diverting digressions offer little ideological solace to right or left. Both views are found wanting. Solutions that he proposes tend to draw from each side of the political spectrum.
Well published in the fields of capital mobility, third world debt issues and global financial regulation, his last four books take aim at the interconnections of rich and poor countries and the latest trends affecting them. Wide-ranging, they are an education in modern economic policy debate.
Misfortunes of Prosperity: An Introduction to Modern Political Economy (MIT Press: 1995) suggests that we are witnessing a healthy return of the classic field of political economy. Further, it can provide decent answers to questions such as
- Are current patterns of economic growth too low to sustain today’s welfare state?
- Will globalization impose a universal economic model, akin to the 19th century’s, and thus end the social democratic state as we know it?
- Is worldwide affluence just a dream? Can modern economies balance their needs for efficiency and solidarity?
In tackling these questions, Cohen intelligently reflects about the causes of the “Golden Age” of post-World War II capitalist growth, the factors explaining slower rates of growth since, an interesting analysis of what causes joblessness, the “shadow” side of Keynesianism, the strengths and weaknesses of monetarist theory and policy, and others.
The Wealth of the World and the Poverty of Nations (MIT Press, 1998) picks up where the last book left off. (In some ways, Cohen is writing just one book, published in installments.) Issues covered include the poverty of much of the world, the East Asian development successes, growing fears in the West about low-wage competition in developing countries, the nature of the Third Industrial Revolution, unemployment and exclusion in Western European economies, and the bankruptcy of present political efforts to deal prudently and fairly with these challenges. Cohen is actually optimistic in the sense that we are intellectually and wealthy enough to foster a decent standard of living worldwide.
Our Modern Times: The New Nature of Capitalism in the Information Age (MIT Press, 2003) is Cohen’s foray into the “New Economy.” He traces the roots of this economy back to the 1960s and its political movements, which sought to reduce standardization, to increase initiative, and promote decentralization and the Global Village. But with flexibility has come added job stress of the new 24/7 workplace. Family, as well as work life is undergoing radical changes, many of which are troubling. In short, what is the future of work? Will there be enough to go around? Will it be spiritually overwhelming and family destroying, while richer in its excitement and learning?
The book, Globalization and its Enemies (2007), is his defense of freer international trading and investment systems and his critique of conventional protectionist policies. Ironically, globalization is generating a stronger opposition, because it has not gone far enough. Developing nations are well aware of their material shortcomings, as shown on the global media. However, economic forces are lagging behind worldwide communication trends. In fact, “the problem is not so much that they {the poor} are exploited by globalization as that they are forgotten and excluded.”