Michael Andrew Žmolek

Current Work       

A contribution to a debate originating at the London HM Conference in 2019 has been published under the title: ‘On “The Problem with Brenner”: The Paradox of Agency and the Heresy of Reification’ in Historical Materialism 29, (Fall 2021).

A paper I gave at the 2020 European Studies Conference at the University of Nebraska, Omaha, October 2-3 titled ‘The Banker Who Ate His Money: Enclosures, Economic Reductionism and the “Corn Model” of David Ricardo’ has recently been published as part of the conference proceedings. This was my fourth of five papers presented at the ESC and a theme has developed out of these papers which I hope some day to turn into a book on enclosures and Political Economy. Previous ESC papers have included: 'Market Dependence, Market Imperatives and the Making of Industrial Capitalism in England’ (2017); ‘Adam Smith as Theorist of Agrarian Capitalism’ (2018); 'The Dark World of Reverend Malthus' (2019); and ‘Blood from a Turnip: The Failure to Apply Laissez-Faire in France, from the Physiocrats to Say’ (2021).

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Mike ZmolekMichael Andrew Žmolek teaches World History, International Studies and Development Studies at the University of Iowa. His book Rethinking the Industrial Revolution (Brill 2013; Haymarket 2014) explores five centuries of English/British history and is part of a broader effort to understand the nature and origins of capitalism. He is currently part of a team writing a world history textbook for Cognella Publishers and is preparing the growndwork for an archival collection on capitalism and the long ninetenth century for Routledge. Mike received a BA in Linguistics and a Certificate of African studies at Iowa before going on to complete his PhD in Political Science at York University in Toronto, where he served as an executive of the Graduate Students' Association for four years. As a legislative assistant in Congress, his work focused on addressing the plight of Gulf Coast survivors of Hurricane Katrina and on drafting articles of impeachment against President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney for representatives Cynthia McKinney (GA) and Dennis Kucinich (OH). As an activist he has worked on the campaign to abolish apartheid in South Africa; opposing tuition hikes for students in Canada; and opposing the bombing, sanctions and military occupation of Iraq.

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