**There will be a book sale before the event at 4:15pm. The sale is organized by the Harvard Coop.**
It is a widespread view that democracy and the advanced nation-state are in crisis, weakened by globalization and undermined by global capitalism, in turn explaining rising inequality and mounting populism. In Democracy and Prosperity: Reinventing Capitalism through a Turbulent Century, two of the world’s leading political economists, argue this view is wrong: advanced democracies are resilient, and their enduring historical relationship with capitalism has been mutually beneficial.
Contrary to the prevailing wisdom on globalization, advanced capitalism is neither footloose nor unconstrained: it thrives under democracy precisely because it cannot subvert it. Populism, inequality, and poverty are indeed great scourges of our time, but these are failures of democracy and must be solved by democracy.
Torben Iversen is the Harold Hitchings Burbank Professor of Political Economy at Harvard University. His books include Women, Work, and Politics and Capitalism, Democracy, and Welfare. David Soskice is School Professor and Professor of Political Science and Economics at the London School of Economics. His books include Macroeconomics: Institutions, Instability, and the Financial System (with Wendy Carlin) and Varieties of Capitalism (edited with Peter A. Hall).
