Introduction
January 27
Harrington, Brooke. 2024. "The Broligarchs Are Trying to Have Their Way." The Atlantic, August 4, 2024.
The military-industrial complex
February 3
Mills, The Power Elite.
A history of big business
February 10
Porter, Gregg. 1973. Chaps. 1-2 in The Rise of Big Business: 1860-1910. New York: Crowell.
Cohen, Deborah. 2023. "The Demise of the 'IBM Way'." The Atlantic, December 13.
Sommer, Jeff. 2024. "A New Measure Shows C.E.O. Pay at Even More Astronomical Levels." New York Times, June 7.
The corporate class
February 17
Domhoff, Who Rules America, Introduction and chaps. 1-3.
Scott, John. 2001. Chaps. 1-2 in Power. Cambridge, UK: Polity.
Capitalist policy networks
February 24
Domhoff, Who Rules America, chaps. 4-8.
Sklair, Leslie. "The Transnational Capitalist Class."
Lipton, Eric. 2024. "Trump Boosters Expect Big Returns on Their Investment: 'The Shackles Are Off'." New York Times, November 17.
Schleifer, Theodore. 2024. "Behind the Scenes at a Secretive Gathering of Rising MAGA Donors." New York Times, November 20.
Neoliberalism
March 3
Harvey, A Brief History of Neoliberalism, chaps. 1-3, 5-7.
Richardson, Heather. 2024. "July 4, 2024." Letters From an American (blog), July 5.
March 8-23
SPRING BREAK.
Scorching the earth: Koch Industries
March 24
Leonard, Kochland (esp. Preface, chaps. 1-4, 6, 11, 13-14, and 16-25).
Friedman, Lisa, Coral Davenport and Brad Plumer. 2025. "Trump Wants to Unleash Energy, as Long as It’s Not Wind or Solar." New York Times, January 21.
Charismatic power: Elon Musk
March 31
1-page term-paper proposals due.
Gelles, David. 2022. "How Jack Welch’s Reign at G.E. Gave Us Elon Musk’s Twitter Feed." New York Times, May 21.
Lepore, Jill. 2023. "The X-Man: How Elon Musk Became a Superhero and Then a Supervillain." New Yorker, September 18.
Sykes, Charlie. 2023 "Elon Musk: The Bigot in Full." The Bulwark (blog), November 16.
Schleifer, Theodore, Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan. 2024. "The Silicon Valley Billionaires Steering Trump's Transition." New York Times, December 6.
Lipton, Eric, Kirsten Grind, David A. Fahrenthold, and Theodore Schleifer. 2024. "Elon Musk Helped Elect Trump. What Does He Expect in Return?" New York Times, November 6.
Mac, Ryan, Jack Nicas and Alex Travelli. 2024. "Elon Musk's Diplomacy: Woo Right-Wing World Leaders. Then Benefit." New York Times, May 12.
Musk, Elon and Vivek Ramaswamy. 2024. "The DOGE Plan to Reform Government." Wall Street Journal, November 20.
Corporate social responsibility
April 7
Shabana, K. 2013. "Corporate social responsibility." In Global Social Issues: An Encyclopedia, edited by C. G. Bates, & J. Ciment. Routledge.
Ray, Victor. 2021. "Why Did Companies Take So Long to Divest from White Supremacy?" Harvard Business Review (blog), January 25.
Wuest, Joanna. 2022. "The Dead End of Corporate Activism." Boston Review (blog), May 18.
Gelles, David. 2023. "How Environmentally Conscious Investing Became a Target of Conservatives." New York Times, February 28.
Ray, Victor and Tsedale M. Melaku. 2023. "Countering the Corporate Diversity Backlash." MIT Sloan Management Review 65(1): 15-16.
Gelles, David and Kenneth P. Vogel. 2024. "Patagonia’s Profits Are Funding Conservation — and Politics." New York Times, January 30.
Nelson, Eshe. 2024. "Banks Made Big Climate Promises. A New Study Doubts They Work." New York Times, April 9.
Kessler, Sarah. 2024. "Don’t Say ‘Elite’: Corporate Firms’ New Pitch Is Meritocracy." New York Times, June 10.
April 14
Part one of term paper due: case description and analysis.
Give 15-minute presentations of case studies in class.
April 21
Presentations of case studies (cont.).
Financial capitalism
April 28
Foroohar, Rana. 2017. Excerpts from Makers and Takers: How Wall Street Destroyed Main Street. New York: Crown Business.
Robbins, Rebecca, Maureen Farrell and Jonathan Weisman. 2025. "Ramaswamy Has a High-Profile Perch and a Raft of Potential Conflicts." New York Times, January 15.
Christophers, Brett. 2023. Introduction, chaps. 1, 4 in Our Lives in Their Portfolios: Why Asset Managers Own the World. London: Verso.
What is to be done?
May 5
Part two of term paper due: theoretical hypothesis due.
Readings TBA, as selected by the class.
Tuesday, May 13: last day of study week
Final draft of term paper due.
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