The Southern Centre for Inequality Studies (SCIS) engages in various research projects in collaboration with multiple institutions. This includes publishing books and book chapters on inequality. Below are some of the books authored by SCIS researchers.
Digital Capitalism and its Limits | Technotopia, power and risk
Author(s): Michel Bauwens
, Ruth Castel-Branco, Mayssam Daaboul, Jane Duncan, Rok Kranjc, Michael Kwet, Alex Mohubetswane Mashilo, Seipati Mokhema, Constantine N Nana, Ujala Satgoor, Vincent Siwawa, Edward Webster
Editor(s): Vishwas Satgar
Click here to access the book.
Digital capitalism promises progresss, development and an end to the planetary crisis. Through a Marxist lens, contributors interrogate the implications of heightened technological innovation on employment, weak market democracies, climate change and labour power dynamics and alternatives for emancipatory futures in a digitalised world.
The Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) has been vaunted as the next big leap in digital capitalism. Technologies such as artificial intelligence, quantum computing, 3D printing and robotisation mark this shift that promises not only more progress, growth and development but also solutions to the multiple crises the world is in. However, the billions being invested in these technologies are accompanied by sharp geopolitical rivalries to secure an edge in the control over them. Volume 8 in the Democratic Marxism series, Digital Capitalism and its Limits, questions the dangerous technotopian imaginary shaping this digital-techno shift to examine the risks and power dynamics involved.Contributors delve into the implications of algorithmic data extractivism, the securitisation of already weak market democracies, the social consequences of digital learning, regulatory lags and power dynamics in the labour process, as well as the possible emancipatory futures of such technologies. Anchored in techno-realism, this volume invites us all, from an interdisciplinary perspective, to think more deeply and critically about digital capitalism. We need to reject aspects of it in the public interest, and we may need to democratise it and subject it to a just transition to protect human and non-human life.
SCIS in collaboration with its’ research network present to you this innovative, interdisciplinary approach to thinking about inequality, and to understanding how inequality is produced and reproduced in the global South.
This exciting interdisciplinary collection brings together scholars from across the global South, and indeed the North, to address broad thematic areas and concludes by suggesting alternatives for addressing inequality in the global South and around the world.
The innovative ideas and theories put forward by this volume make it an essential read for students and researchers of global inequality across the fields of sociology, economics, law, politics, global studies, and development studies.
The volume is published in Southern Africa and Kenya by Wits University Press, (available HERE) and internationally by Routledge (available HERE).
Preface- David Francis, Imraan Valodia and Edward Webster
1. Towards a Southern Approach to Inequality: Inequality Studies in South Africa and the Global South - Edward Webster, Imraan Valodia and David Francis
2. Is Hierarchy the Same as Inequality? - Dilip Menon
3. Inequality Under Globalization: State of Knowledge and Implications for Economics - James K. Galbraith and Jaehee Choi
4. A Survey of Trends in Macroeconomic Policy and Development in the Global South: From World War II to the Global Financial Crisis and Beyond - Vishnu Padayachee
5. Economic Power and Regulation: The Political Economy of Metals, Machinery and Equipment Industries in South Africa - Sumayya Goga, Pamela Mondliwa and Simon Roberts
6. Inegalitarian Growth: India and Brazil Compared- Alexandre de Freitas Barbosa, Maria Cristina Cacciamali and Gerry Rodgers
7. The Crisis of Social Reproduction in Petty Commodity Production and Large-scale Mining: A Southern Perspective on Gender Inequality - Hibist Kassa
8. Vocational Education and Inequalities in Transitions from Education to Work in Three African Countries - Stephanie Allais
9. Investigating Infrastructures of Urban Inequality - Margot Rubin, Melanie Samson, Sian Butcher, Avril Joffe, Stefania Merlo, Laila Smith and Alex Wafer
10. Social Reproduction at End Moments: Land, Class Formation and Rural Economies in Ghana and South Africa - Akua Britwam and Ben Scully
11. Minimum Wages: Tackling Labour Market Inequality - Patrick Belser, David Francis, Kim Jurgensen and Imraan Valodia
12. Building Counter Power in the Workplace: South Africa’s Inequality Paradox - Edward Webster
13. Global Inequality and Human Rights - Radhika Balakrishnan
14. Conclusion - David Francis, Edward Webster and Imraan Valodia
20% discount available, Flyer Inequality Studies. eBooks available here
