Essay on Political Economy

The economy is never neutral. Behind every price lies a decision, behind every rent lies domination, and behind every crisis lies collective blindness. This book offers law students a deep dive into the heart of political economy, a discipline that refuses to separate what academic tradition has all too often severed: the study of wealth and that of power, institutions, and power relations. Designed as a textbook for legal professionals, this book presents a critical genealogy of contemporary assumptions. It engages in dialogue with Adam Smith to remind us that the invisible hand cannot compensate for the absence of institutions; with Karl Marx to reflect on the unsettling truth that property is a social relationship of domination; and with John Maynard Keynes to show that the state must reclaim its role as a helmsman in troubled waters. From property and social classes to the market, from contracts to the state, from money to credit, from labor to wages, all the way to economic regulation and crises, each chapter reaffirms the same thesis: the economy is always a symptom of politics, and the law is the language in which power compromises are forged.