Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-cb9f654ff-rkzlw Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-08-04T04:41:59.800Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

1 - The State of the Art of Social Structure of Accumulation Theory

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2012

By
Terrence McDonough
Edited by
Terrence McDonough ,
Michael Reich  and
David M. Kotz
Terrence McDonough
Affiliation:
National University of Ireland, Galway
Terrence McDonough
Affiliation:
National University of Ireland, Galway
Michael Reich
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
David M. Kotz
Affiliation:
University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Get access

Summary

This chapter provides an overview of the state of the art of the social structure of accumulation (SSA) literature produced since 1994. Any such project must start with David Gordon's last contributions before his untimely death in 1996. In addition, there have been a number of contributions from the academic discipline of sociology, including the founding of a “spatialization” school extending the work of Gordon, Edwards, and Reich's original Segmented Work, Divided Workers. There have been a number of works extending the geographic reach of the SSA framework to new areas, most prominently to developing countries. Several authors have applied the SSA framework to the history and analysis of specific institutions. Such an overview is supplied in the first section below. Following that section we will assess the theoretical contributions made by these works in the last ten years or so. Finally, we will discuss the debate over whether a new SSA was consolidated after the stagflation crisis of the 1970s and early 1980s. If an SSA was consolidated, the current economic crisis results from the disintegration of that SSA. If an SSA was not consolidated, what we are witnessing today is the continuation of the unresolved collapse of the postwar SSA.

An Overview of the Last Decade

David Gordon's Last Works

David Gordon's continuing contributions were primarily in the area of building econometric models that drew on the insights of SSA analysis to provide an alternative representation of the dynamics of the U.S. economy in the postwar period.

Information

Type
Chapter
Information
Contemporary Capitalism and its Crises
Social Structure of Accumulation Theory for the 21st Century
 , pp. 23 - 44
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Book purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Arena, John 2003. “Race and Hegemony: The Neoliberal Transformation of the Black Urban Regime and Working-Class Resistance.” American Behavioral Scientist 47, 3: 352–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barlow, David E. and Barlow, Melissa Hickman 1995. “Federal Criminal Justice Legislation and the Post-World War II Social Structure of Accumulation in the United States.” Crime, Law and Social Change 22, 3: 239–67.Google Scholar
Barlow, David E., Barlow, Melissa Hickman, and Chiricos, Theodore G. 1993. “Long Economic Cycles and the Criminal Justice System in the U.S.”Crime, Law and Social Change 19: 143–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boushey, Heather and Pressman, Steven 1997. “The Economic Contributions of David M. Gordon.” Review of Political Economy 9, 2: 225–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bowles, Samuel, Edwards, Richard, and Roosevelt, Frank 2005. Understanding Capitalism: Competition, Command and Change. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Brady, David and Wallace, Michael 2000. “Spatialization, Foreign Direct Investment and Labor Outcomes in the American States, 1978–1996.” Social Forces 79, 1: 67–105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carlson, Susan M. and Michalowski, Raymond J. 1997. “Crime, Unemployment, and Social Structures of Accumulation: An Inquiry into Historical Contingency.” Justice Quarterly 14, 2: 209.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gordon, David M. 1988. “The Global Economy: New Edifice or Crumbling Foundations?” New Left Review 68: 24–64.Google Scholar
Gordon, David M. 1994. “Putting Heterodox Macro to the Test: Comparing Post-Keynesian, Marxian and Social Structuralist Macroeconomic Models of the Post-War U.S. Economy.” Pp. 143–185 in Glick, Mark, ed. Competition, Technology and Money: Classical and Post-Keynesian Perspectives. Cheltenham: Elgar.Google Scholar
Gordon, David M. 1996. Fat and Mean: The Corporate Squeeze of Working Americans and the Myth of Managerial “Downsizing.”New York: The Free Press.Google Scholar
Gordon, David M. 1997. “From the Drive System to the Capital-Labor Accord: Econometric Tests for the Transition between Productivity Regimes.” Industrial Relations 36, 2: 125–59.Google Scholar
Gordon, David M., Bowles, Samuel and Weisskopf, Thomas E. 1998 (1994). “Power, Profits, and Investment: An Institutional Explanation of the Stagnation of U.S. Net Investment After the Mid-1960s.” Working Paper no. 12. New School for Social Research. Reprinted in Bowles, Samuel and Weisskopf, Thomas E. eds. Economics and Social Justice: Essays on Power, Labor and Institutional Change. Cheltenham: Elgar.Google Scholar
Gruneberg, Stephen and Ive, Graham J. 2000. The Economics of the Modern Construction Firm. London: Palgrave.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grant, Don Sherman 1995. “The Political Economy of Business Failures across the American States, 1970–1985: The Impact of Reagan's New Federalism.” American Sociological Review 60, 6: 851–73.Google Scholar
Grant, Don Sherman 1996. “The Political Economy of New Business Formation across the American States, 1970–1985.” Social Science Quarterly 77, 1: 28–42.Google Scholar
Grant, Don Sherman and Hutchinson, Richard 1996. “Global Smokestack Chasing: A Comparison of the State-level Determinants of Foreign and Domestic Manufacturing Investment.” Social Problems 43: 21–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grant, Don Sherman and Martinez, Ramiro 1997. “Crime and the Restructuring of the U.S. Economy: A Reconsideration of the Class Linkages.” Social Forces 75, 3: 769–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grant, Don Sherman and Wallace, Michael 1994. “The Political Economy of Manufacturing Growth and Decline across the American States, 1970–1985.” Social Forces 73, 1: 33–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamilton, Rosalea 1994. “Analyzing Real Wages, Prices and Productivity and the Effects of State Intervention in Caribbean-type Economies.” Social and Economic Studies 43, 1: 1–42.Google Scholar
Harriss-White, Barbara 2003. India Working: Essays on Society and Economy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Heintz, James 2002. “Political Conflict and the Social Structure of Accumulation – the Case of South African Apartheid.” Review of Radical Political Economics 34, 3: 319–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Houston, David 1992. “Is There a New Social Structure of Accumulation?” Review of Radical Political Economics 24, 2: 60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jeong, Seongjin 1997. “The Social Structure of Accumulation in South Korea.” Review of Radical Political Economics 29, 4: 92–112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kotz, David M. 2003. “Neoliberalism and the Social Structure of Accumulation Theory of Long-run Capital Accumulation.” Review of Radical Political Economics 35, 3: 263–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kotz, David M. 2004. “The Regulation Theory and the Social Structure of Accumulation Approach.” Pp. 85–97 in Kotz, David M., McDonough, Terrence and Reich, Michael eds. Social Structures of Accumulation: The Political Economy of Growth and Crisis. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Kotz, David M. 2009. “The Financial and Economic Crisis of 2008: A Systemic Crisis of Neoliberal Capitalism.” Review of Radical Political Economics 41, 3: 305–317.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kotz, David M., McDonough, Terrence and Reich, Michael 1994a. Social Structures of Accumulation: The Political Economy of Growth and Crisis. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kotz, David M. 1994b. “Introduction.” Pp. 1–8 in Kotz, David M., McDonough, Terrence and Reich, Michael eds. Social Structures of Accumulation: The Political Economy of Growth and Crisis. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Li, Minqi 2004. “After Neoliberalism: Empire, Social Democracy, or Socialism.” Monthly Review 55, 8: 21–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Li, Minqi 2005. “The Rise of China and the Demise of the Capitalist World-economy: Exploring Historical Possibilities in the 21st Century.” Science and Society 69, 3: 420–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lippit, Victor D. 1997. “The Reconstruction of a Social Structure of Accumulation in the United States.” Review of Radical Political Economics 29, 3: 11–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lippit, Victor D. 2005. Capitalism. Oxon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Lobao, Linda, Rulli, Jamie and Brown, Lawrence A. 1999. “Macrolevel Theory and Local-level Inequality: Industrial Structure, Institutional Arrangements, and the Political Economy of Redistribution, 1970 and 1990.” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 89, 4: 571–601.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mihail, Dimitrios 1993. “Modeling Profits and Industrial Investment in Postwar Greece.”International Review of Applied Economics 7, 3: 290–310.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mihail, Dimitrios 1995. “The Productivity Slowdown in Postwar Greece.” Labour 9, 2: 189–205.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McDonough, Terrence 1995. “Lenin, Imperialism, and Stages of Capitalist Development.” Science and Society 59, 3: 339–67.Google Scholar
McDonough, Terrence 1999. “Gordon's Accumulation Theory: The Highest Stage of Stadial Theory.” Review of Radical Political Economics 31, 4: 6–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McDonough, Terrence 2003. “What Does Long Wave Theory Have to Contribute to the Debate on Globalization?” Review of Radical Political Economics 35, 3: 280–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Michalowski, Raymond J. and Carlson, Susan M. 1999. “Unemployment, Imprisonment, and Social Structures of Accumulation: Historical Contingency in the Rusche-Kirchheimer Hypothesis.” Criminology 37, 2: 217–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Michalowski, Raymond J. 2000. “Crime, Punishment, and Social Structures of Accumulation: Toward a New and Much Needed Political-Economy of Justice.” Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice 16, 3: 272–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Naples, Michele I. 1996. “Labor Relations and Social Structures of Accumulation: The Case of U.S. Coal Mining.” Pp. 109–130 In Bina, Cyrus, Clements, Laurie and Davis, Chuck eds. Beyond Survival: Wage Labor in the Late Twentieth Century. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.Google Scholar
Nilsson, Eric A. 1996. “The Breakdown of the U.S. Postwar System of Labor Relations: An Econometric Study.” Review of Radical Political Economics 28, 1: 20–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nilsson, Eric A. 1997. “The Growth of Union Decertification: A Test of Two Non-nested Theories.” Industrial Relations 36, 3: 324–48.Google Scholar
O#x0027;Hara, Philip Anthony 2000. Marx, Veblen and Contemporary Institutional Political Economy: Principles and Unstable Dynamics of Capitalism. Cheltenham: Elgar.Google Scholar
O'Hara, Philip Anthony 2006. Growth and Development in the Global Political Economy: Social Structures of Accumulation and Modes of Regulation. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Perrucci, Robert 1994. Japanese Auto Transplants in the Heartland: Corporatism and Community. New York: Aldine de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Prechel, Harland 2000. Big Business and the State: Historical Transitions and Corporate Transformation, 1880s–1990s. Albany: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Reich, Michael 1997. “Social Structure of Accumulation Theory: Retrospect and Prospect.” Review of Radical Political Economics 29, 3: 1–10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reich, Michael 1998. “Are U.S. Corporations Top-heavy? Managerial Ratios in Advanced Capitalist Countries.” Review of Radical Political Economics 30, 3: 33–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robinson, William I. 2003. Transnational Conflicts: Central America, Social Change, and Globalization. London: Verso.Google Scholar
Robinson, William I. 2004. A Theory of Global Capitalism. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Saros, Daniel E. 2009. Labour, Industry, and Regulation during the Progressive Era. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Went, Robert 2002. The Enigma of Globalization: A Journey to a New Stage of Capitalism. London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wolfson, Martin H. 2003. “Neoliberalism and the Social Structure of Accumulation.” Review of Radical Political Economics 35, 3: 255–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Accessibility standard: Unknown

Accessibility compliance for the PDF of this book is currently unknown and may be updated in the future.

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×