THE DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY SEMINAR NO 8/ 15. 5. 2024

Dear colleagues,

I am happy to invite all members and students to the next seminar of the department. Professor of Colonial and Postcolonial Studies Gurminder Bhambra (University of Sussex) will present her debate with the leading scholars John Holmwood and Loïc Wacquant about contemporary issues related to The Trouble with (Racial) Capitalism.

15.5. at 4:00 PM in room B103B   

Below, you will find a short bio, an annotation, and sources

Bio:

Gurminder K Bhambra is a Professor of Historical Sociology in the Department of International Relations at the University of Sussex. She is a Fellow of the British Academy (FBA), of the Academy of Social Sciences (FAcSS), and the Royal Historical Society (FRHistS). She is currently working on her Leverhulme Trust Major Research Fellowship project (2022-24), ‘Varieties of Colonialism, Varieties of Empire’. She has been President of the British Sociological Association and Trustee of the Sociological Review Foundation.

Annotation:

In a recent essay, Loïc Wacquant asks whether the term, racial capitalism, is ‘a conceptual solution or a conceptual problem’. His answer is that racial capitalism has no place in a properly defined and understood social science. In our response to his piece, John Holmwood and I set out some of the limitations of Wacquant’s analysis and, at the same time, discuss other difficulties of the idea of racial capitalism. These difficulties, we suggest, are associated with an absence common to Wacquant and the major proponents of racial capitalism; namely, a failure to reckon systematically with the ways in which modern capitalism arises and develops within the global structures of European colonialism.

Sources:

Loïc’s original essay: Wacquant L. The Trap of “Racial Capitalism.” European Journal of Sociology. 2023;64(2):153-162. doi:10.1017/S0003975623000334. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/european-journal-of-sociology-archives-europeennes-de-sociologie/article/abs/trap-of-racial-capitalism/E069EE95031108001EE19E8694E047B9

Gurminder and John's comments: Bhambra GK, Holmwood J. The Trap of “Capitalism”, Racial or Otherwise. European Journal of Sociology. 2023;64(2):163-172. doi:10.1017/S000397562300036X - https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/european-journal-of-sociology-archives-europeennes-de-sociologie/article/trap-of-capitalism-racial-or-otherwise/59DC117C050AE9FC4FB73BBE5682473D

Loïc’s answer to Gurminder and John: Wacquant L. Racial Capitalism Decoupled: A Rejoinder and Reformulation. European Journal of Sociology. 2023;64(2):183-193. doi:10.1017/S0003975623000346 - https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/european-journal-of-sociology-archives-europeennes-de-sociologie/article/abs/racial-capitalism-decoupled-a-rejoinder-and-reformulation/8C7D8EA87C0F93A071ADE5F705DD7647

Looking forward to meeting you,

Jitka Wirthová