Mark McGann Blyth
Professional Positions
2009 – Present
Eastman Professor of Political Economy, Brown University.
(Joint Appointment Between the Watson Institute for International Studies and the Department of Political Science)
Brown University, Providence RI.
2005-2009:
Associate Professor of Political Science
The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
1997-2005: Assistant Professor of Political Science
The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore MD.
Education
1995-1999 Ph.D.Columbia UniversityPolitical Science
1990-1991Language TrainingStrathclyde UniversityRussian Language
1986-1990B.A. (First Class)Strathclyde University Political Science
Ph.D. Comprehensive Exams: International Relations and Comparative Politics
Dissertation: Great Transformations: Economic Ideas and Political Change in the Twentieth Century. Awarded with distinction, May 1999
Research Interests
International and Comparative Political Economy, the Politics of Finance, the Politics of Ideas, Institutional Change, Uncertainty and Complexity, the History of Political Economy
Publications
Books: Single Author
Great Transformations: Economic Ideas and Institutional Change in the Twentieth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2002). Arabic edition 2009, Chinese edition 2010.
Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea (New York: Oxford University Press 2013). Translated into Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese (complex and simple), Arabic, German, Greek, Korean, Japanese, Croatian. Paperback versionwith new 50 page afterward (2015).
Awards for Austerity:
Financial Times, ‘Books of the Year 2013’ – Economics List
The 2014 Hans MatthöfferWirtschaftspublizistik-Preis, “Wirtschaft. Weiter. Denken,” by the Matthöffer and Friedrich Ebert Foundations, Berlin, Germany
Reviews of Austerity
New York Review of Books, by Paul Krugman,
Financial Times, by Larry Summers,
‘The End of the Line’
The New Yorker, John Cassidy, May 20th 2013.
BooksEdited:
The Future of the Euro (ed.) (with Matthias Matthijs), forthcoming with Oxford University Press in 2015.
Constructing the International Economy, (ed.) with RawiAbdelal and Craig Parsons)
(Ithaca: Cornell University Press 2010).
The Handbook of International Political Economy: IPE as a Global Conversation(ed.) (New York: Routledge Press 2009).
The Transformation of Great American School Districts: How Big Cities Are Reshaping Public Education,(ed.) with William Lowe Boyd, and Charles Taylor Kerchner, (Cambridge: Harvard Education Press 2008).
Journal Articles
“Print Less but Transfer More: Why Central Banks Should Give Money Directly to the People.” Foreign Affairs, September/October 2014 (with Eric Lonergan).
“A Curious Case of Caveats and Causes: Some Thoughts on the Causal Story of Banking Across Boundaries,” Environment and Planning, Symposium Contribution, Spring 2014.
“Austerity as Ideology: A Reply to my Critics,” Comparative European Politics, 11 (6) December 2013: 737-751.
“Constructivism and the Study of International Political Economy in China,” Review of International Political Economy, 20 (6) December 2013: 1276-1299 (with Qingxin K. Wang).
“The Austerity Delusion: How a Dangerous Idea Won Over the West,” Foreign Affairs, April/May 2013: 41-56.
“The BRICs and the Washington Consensus: An Introduction,” Special Issue of the Review of International Political Economy, ‘Dreaming with the BRICs,’ 20 (2) April 2013: 241-255 (with Cornel Ban).
“Paradigms and Paradox: The Politics of Economics Ideas in Two Moments of Crisis.” Governance, 26 (4) December 2012.
“What Can Okun Teach Polanyi? Efficiency, Regulation and Equality in the OECD” Review of International Political Economy, February 2012, (with Jonathan Hopkin).
“Introduction to the Special Issue on the Evolution of Institutions” with Geoffrey M. Hodgson, Orion Lewis, Sven Steinmo, The Journal of Evolutionary Economics, 7 (3) September 2011, pp. 1-17.
“The Black Swan of Cairo: How Suppressing Volatility Makes the World Less Predictable and More Dangerous” Foreign Affairs, 90 (3) April 2011 (with NassimTaleb).
“The Ghosts of Corporatism’s Past and Past Corporatisms,”Capitalism and Society: 5 (3) (2011): 1-22.
“What if Most Swans are Black? The Unsettling World of NassimTaleb” Critical Review, January 2010.
“Torn Between Two Lovers: Caught in the Middle of British and American IPE” New Political Economy, 14 (3) (2009): 329-336.
“The Secret Life of Institutions: On the Role of Ideas in Evolving Economic Systems”
Revue de la Régulation: Capitalisme, Institutions, Pouvoirs. n°3/4, novembre 2008, pp: 1-11.
“The Politics of Compounding Bubbles: The Global Housing Bubble in Comparative Perspective.” Comparative European Politics, Fall 2008, pp. 387-406.
“Beyond the Usual Suspects: Ideas, Uncertainty, and Building Institutional Orders” International Studies Quarterly, 51 (4) December 2007 pp. 761-777.
“The Social Construction of Wars and Crises as Mechanisms of Change” International Studies Quarterly 51 (4) December 2007, (with Wesley W. Widmaier and Leonard Seabrooke) pp. 747-759.
“Great Punctuations: Prediction, Randomness, and the Evolution of Comparative Political Science” American Political Science Review 100 (4) November (2006) pp. 493-498.
“Domestic Institutions and the Possibility of Social Democracy,” Comparative European Politics, 3 (4) December (2005) pp. 379-407.
“Globalization Didn’t Make You Do It! Understanding Social Democratic Party Choices” (“La Globalizzazione e ilMutamentodella Social Democrazia”) Meridiana - Rivista di Storia e ScienzeSociali Vol. 50-51 (2005) pp. 41-70. Special issue on ‘Reformism and Counter-Reformism in Europe’ (with Jonathan Hopkin).
“From Catch all Politics to Cartelization: The Political Economy of the Cartel Party,” Western European Politics Vol. 28 (1) January 2005, pp. 34-61 (with Richard S. Katz).
“The Great Transformation in Understanding Polanyi: A Response to Hejeebu and McCloskey,” Critical Review 16 (1) August 2004 pp. 117-130.
“Structures do not Come with an Instruction Sheet: Interests, Ideas and Progress in Political Science,” Perspectives on Politics 1 (4), December 2003 pp. 695-703.
“Our Past as Prolog: Introduction to the Tenth Anniversary Special Issue of the Review of International Political Economy 10 (4) December 2003 pp. 607-620. (With HendrikSpruyt).
“Globalization and the Limits of Democratic Choice: Social Democracy and the Rise of Political Cartelization” InternationalePolitik und Gesellschaft - International Politics and Society 6 (3) (July) 2003 pp. 60-82.
“Same as it Never Was? Typology and Temporality in the Varieties of Capitalism,” Comparative European Politics 1 (2) Summer 2003 pp. 215-225.
“From Comparative Capitalism to Economic Constructivism,” New Political Economy 8 (2) (July) 2003 pp. 263-274.
“The Transformation of the Swedish Model: Economic Ideas, Distributional Conflict and Institutional Change” World Politics 54 (1) October 2001 pp. 1-26.
“The Ghost in the Machine? The Specter of Marx in the Matrix” PolitologiskeStudere 4 (4) December 2001 pp. 86-91 (with Robin Varghese)
“The State of the Discipline in American Political Science: Be Careful What You Wish For?” British Journal of Politics and International Relations 1 (3) October 1999 pp. 345-365 (with Robin Varghese).
“Moving the Political Middle: Redefining the Boundaries of State Action” Political Quarterly July 1997 pp. 231-240.
“Any More Bright Ideas? The Ideational Turn of Comparative Political Economy.”
Comparative Politics 29 (1) January 1997, pp. 229-250.
Journal Articles in Process
“The Sovereign Debt Crisis That Isn’t: Or, How to Turn an Lending Crisis into a Spending Crisis and Pocket the Spread.” For WSI-Mitteilungen (German Trade Union Research Center) in 2015.
“Inference and Confidence in International Relations Theory,” (with Craig Parsons) for World Politics in 2015.
“Schumpeter’s Paradox: Creative Destruction, Destructive Creation, and International Primacy,” intended for International Organization in 2015.
Forthcoming Book Chapters
“When you find Yourself Going through Hell, Look for an Exit,” contribution to a Gulbenkian Foundation project, Portugal, Lisbon, entitled, Imagining the Future (ed.) ViriatoSoromenho-Marques, forthcoming in 2015.
“Introduction: The Future of the Euro and the Politics of Embedded Currency Areas,” (with Matthias Matthijs) in Matthias Matthijs and Mark Blyth, (eds.) The Future of the Euro (Oxford University Press 2015), pp. 1-21.
“Conclusion: The Future of the Euro – Possible Futures, Risks, and Uncertainties,” (with Matthias Matthijs) in Matthias Matthijs and Mark Blyth, (eds.) The Future of the Euro (Oxford University Press 2015), pp. 249-271.
“Just Who Put You in Charge? We Did: Credit Rating Agencies and the Politics of Ratings,” chapter for Alexander Cooley (ed.), Rankings and Ratings Organizations and Global Governance, (Cambridge University Press 2015) (with RawiAbdelal).
“Ideas and Historical Institutionalism,” contribution to the Oxford Handbook of Historical Institutionalism, forthcoming in 2015, co-authored with OddnyHelgadottir and Bill Kring.
Published Book Chapters
Reprint of “Constructivism and the Study of International Political Economy in China,” (with Qingxin K. Wang) in Chin G. (et al.) (eds.) International Political Economy in China: The Global Conversation (London: Routledge 2015)
“This Time It is Really Different: Europe, the Financial Crisis and Staying on Top in the Twenty-First Century” in Daniel Breznitz and John Zysman (eds.) The Third Globalization: Can Wealthy Nations Stay Rich in the Twenty-First Century?
(New York: Oxford University Press 2013).
“Ideas, Uncertainty and Evolution,” in Robert Cox and Daniel Beland (eds.)Ideas and Politics in Social Science Research Oxford University Press 2010, pp. 83-101.
“Constructing the International Economy,” in Abdelal, Blyth and Parsons (eds.), Constructing the International Economy, Ithaca: Cornell University Press 2010.
“Re-Constructing IPE: Some Conclusions Drawn from a Crisis” in Abdelal, Blyth and Parsons, (eds.) Constructing the International Economy, Ithaca: Cornell University Press 2010.
“On Setting Up and Upsetting Agendas” Contribution to an edited volume by Andreas Gofas and Colin Hay (eds.) The Ideational Turn in Social Science Research. London, Routledge 2010.
“Torn Between Two Lovers: Caught in the Middle of British and American IPE,”
in Nicola Phillips and Catherine Weaver (eds.) International Political Economy: Debating the Past, Present and Future (London: Routledge 2011): pp. 133-141.)
“An Approach to Comparative Analysis, or a Sub-Field Within a Sub-Field? Political Economy,” in Mark Lichbach and Alan Zuckerman, Comparative Politics: Rationality, Culture, and Structure. Cambridge University Press, 2009.
“One Ring to Bind them All: American Power and Neoliberal Capitalism,” in Sven Steinmo and Jeff Kopstein (eds.) Growing Apart: America and Europe in the Twenty-First Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2007) pp. 109-136.
“When Liberalisms Change: Comparing the Politics of Deflations and Inflations,” in Arthur T. Denzau, Thomas C. Willett, and Ravi K. Roy (eds.) Neoliberalism, National and Regional Experiments with Global Ideas (London and New York: Routledge 2006)
“Ideas and Interests” in Roy Macridis and Bernard Brown (eds.) Comparative Politics: Notes and Readings (New York: Harcourt Brace 2006).
“The Political Power of Financial Ideas: Transparency, Risk and Distribution in Global Finance” in Jonathan Kirshner (ed.) Monetary Orders (Cornell University Press 2003) pp. 239-259.
“Institutions and Ideas” in Dave Marsh and Gerry Stoker (eds.) Theory and Methods in Political Science (London: Macmillan 2002) pp. 292-311.
Books in Process
The Greediest Generation? The Baby Boomers and the Crisis of Prosperity (with Sven Steinmo), underway in 2014-15.
Schumpeter’s Paradox: When Destructive Creation Outruns Creative Destruction – Book Project for 2016
Last Man Standing: How Central Banks Ended Up Running the World and Why That’s A Big Problem – Book Project for 2017
Published Working Papers and Similar
“The Sovereign Debt Crisis that Isn’t: Or, How to Turn a Lending Crisis into a Spending Crisis and Pocket the Spread.” American Consortium on EU Studiesworking papers series (ACES) at American University, Washington DC.
“International Political Economy,” Entry in IPSA/Sage International Encyclopedia of Political Science, (Sage: London and New York 2011).
“The Opium of the Marxists: Embracing Indeterminacy in the International Political Economy,” (with Charlotte Epstein, Leonard Seabrooke, and Jason Sharman). BSIA IPEG working paper, 2009.
“Cartel Politics and Social Democratic Policy Change,” Georgetown University BMW Center for German and European Studies, Occasional Paper Series, Working Paper 5-03, July 2003.
Non-Disciplinary Writings, Reviews, and Interviews (Recent Selections)
“Its Not About the Money: Why Scotland Might Just Say Yes to Independence,” Foreign Affairs, September 14th 2014 -
“To Fix the Economy Let’s Print Money and Mail it to Everyone,” interview with Vox (with Eric Lonergan and Dylan Matthews)
Fortune Magazine, September 4th 2014, “To get Europe out of its Economic Rut: Give its People Cash.” (With Eric Lonergan) (
Der Spiegel, “Deutschland Schafft das Nicht,” Interview in Der Spiegel, 42 (2013): 130-133,
“End Austerity Now,” Project Syndicate Column, published in 24 countries in 12 languages during September 2013.
‘Austerity’s Bait and Switch’ Harvard Business Review Idea Cast,
‘The Fiscal Cliff is Just a Long Overdue Hangover”
“Spain is now making Ireland’s Mistakes”
“Three Reasons the Eurozone Deal Won’t Work”
“Why Only Germany Can Fix the Euro”
“Greece, Lehman, and the politics of Too Big To Fail”
How to Turn a Continent Into a Subprime CDO”
“Albert Hirschman, Alan Greenspan, and the Problem of Intellectual Capture”
“Paradigms Lost? Cowboys and Indians in the Battle over Economic Ideas.”
“The Real Reason the Bailouts May Not Work” Huffington Post, December 2010
“What History Bodes for the Tea Party,” Triple Crisis, November 2010.
“The G20s Dead Ideas,” Foreign Policy (web edition), July 2010.
“Bouncy-Castle Finance,” Foreign Affairs Magazine (web edition), September 2009.
Book Reviews
Friedman, Fortune Tellers: The Story of America's First Economic Forecasters. The American Historical Review, 2014 119 (5): 1704-1705.
Katznelson, Fear Itself: The New Deal and the Origins of Our Time, Dissent, fall 2013.
Schmidt, The Futures of European Capitalism, Perspectives on Politics 2 (3) September 2004.
Hall and Soskice, Varieties of Capitalism: The Institutional Foundations of Comparative Advantage, Western European Politics Fall 2002.
Lichbach and Seligman, Market and Community: The Basis of Social Order, Revolution, and Relegitimation. American Political Science Review June 2002.
Arrighi and Silver, Chaos and Governance in the Modern World System. Political Science Quarterly 115 (1) Spring 2000.
Broberg and Roll-Hansen, Eugenics and the Welfare State: Sterilization Policy in Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland. Governance 12 (1) January 1999.
Selected Invited Academic Presentations
“When You Find Yourself Going Through Hell, Look for an Exit,” Providence College, November 14th 2014.
“Wie Europa sichKaputtspart – die gescheiterteIdee der Austeritätspolitik,” Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, Berlin, Germany, November 11th 2014.
“When You Find Yourself Going Through Hell, Look for an Exit,” Watson Political Economy Forum, Brown University, October 14th 2014.
“Unconscious Uncoupling: Ideas, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Historical Institutionalism,” Comparative Historical Social Science Workshop, Northwestern University, October 10th 2014
“When You Find Yourself Going Through Hell, Look for an Exit,” Gulbenkian Foundation, Social Policy Conference, Keynote Address, Lisbon, Portugal, October 7th 2014.
“Is the European Recession Secular or Policy Driven?” Presentation at Center for European Reform (London) Annual Conference on Europe, Ditchley Park, Oxfordshire, October 3rd and 4th, 2014.
“The Ten Year Long Recession? Why the Future of Europe is not Bright and why this Matters to Asia.” Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, September 16th 2014.
Austerity Roundtable, INET Event hosted by Department of Economics, Kemmy Business School, University of Limerick, Ireland, May 30th 2014.
“If Heterodoxy is So Great, Why isn’t it the Orthodoxy?” Copenhagen Business School, May 6th 2014.
‘Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea,’ Universite de Montreal, Canada, March 17th 2014.
‘The Sovereign Debt Crisis That Isn’t: Or, How to Turn a Lending Crisis into a Spending Crisis and Pocket the Spread.’ McGill University, European Politics Colloquium, April 17th 2014.
‘The Sovereign Debt Crisis That Isn’t: Or, How to Turn a Lending Crisis into a Spending Crisis and Pocket the Spread.’ Panelist, Conference of Europeanists, Washington DC, March 15th 2014.
‘The Future of the Euro’ Panel Chair, Conference of Europeanists, Washington DC, March 14th 2014.
‘Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea,’ Juan March Institute, Inaugural Lecture, February 7th 2014.
‘Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea,’ Lisbon University Law School, November 29th 2013.
‘Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea,’ Koç University, Istanbul, Turkey, November 7th 2013
“How Not to do Economic Policymaking in a Democracy: The Case of the Eurozone Crisis” Keynote Address, European University Institute Summer Conference “Are Democracy and Capitalism Still Reconcilable?” Florence, Italy, July 2nd 2013.
‘Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea,’ John Hopkins University, SAIS, April 15th 2013
‘Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea,’ Columbia University, Blinken Center for European Studies, April 10th 2013.
‘Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea,’ New York University, ‘In Print’ series with James Hoge as host, April 1st 2013
‘Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea,’ Malim Harding Memorial Lecture, University of Toronto, March 14th 2013
‘Austerity and Keynesian Economics,’ Lyons Memorial Lecture,’ Franklin and Marshall College, March 4th 2013
‘Austerity and Banking Crises,’ Cornell University IR and Law seminar, February 25th 2013.
Co-convener of authors’ conference, ‘The Future of the Euro,’ Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Service, Washington DC, December 5th 2012 (joint project with Matthias Matthijs).
‘Austerity’ book talk, Max Planck Institute for Social Research, Cologne, Germany, November 22nd 2012.
Austerity book talk, University of Pennsylvania, Penn Social Science and Policy Forum, November 9th and 10th 2012.
Discussant at Center for European Reform (London) Annual Conference on Europe, Ditchley Park, Oxfordshire, November 9th and 10th, 2012.
“It’s a Banking Crisis - Stupid!” Presentation at author’s conference on the Crisis in Europe, University of Toronto, October 13th 2012
Discussant at author’s workshop on Political Sociology and Political Economy in French and American scholarship, University of Bordeaux, May 10th and 11th 2012
Presenter, SAIS Bologna Center, Italy, Seminar on Risk and Uncertainty, April 26th 2012
Conference convener and organizer, “The Failure of the Euro?” Brown University, April 17th 2012.
Discussant, Panel on Social Capital, Institute for New Economic Thinking Conference, New York City, November 4th-6th, 2011.
“The Global Financial Crisis: Long Run Causes and Long Term Issues” UC Riverside International Studies Public Forum Talk, March 10th 2011.
“European Sado-Monetarism? Germany and the Financial Crisis”. Contribution to a workshop on, Germany and the Future of the Euro, Georgetown University, December 5th 2010.
“This Time it Really is Different: Europe, The Financial Crisis, and Staying on Top in the 21st Century”Tertulias Seminar, InstitutoEmpresa, Madrid, Spain July 5th 2010
“It Worked Best When It Didn’t And Mattered Most When It Ended: The Rise And Fall Of Bretton Woods” Harvard Law School, Cambridge MA, April 1st 2010.
“The Political Economy Of Future Regulation: Bouncy Castles, Systemic Risk, And The Pitfalls Of Reform” JFK School, Harvard University, March 31st 2010
“What I Learned (and Un-learned) at the Global Financial Crisis,” LBJ School, University of Texas at Austin, 16th November 2009.