Publications

18 Apr 2018
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, April 18, 2018

forthcoming Academy of Management Journal Ideological Misfit? Political Affiliation and Employee Departure in the Private-Equity Industry By: Bermiss, Y. Sekou, and Rory McDonald Abstract—Though organizations are increasingly active... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2025
Working Paper

Turning Away from the State: Trade Shocks and Informal Insurance in Brazil

By: Paula Rettl

How does economic globalization affect vote choices? Conventional wisdom holds that voters who lose from economic integration support parties that propose expanding the welfare state. However, in the Global South, where the state is frequently weak or under-resourced,... View Details

Keywords: Global Strategy; Globalized Economies and Regions; Governance; Government Administration; Political Elections; Voting; Latin America; Brazil; South America

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06 Dec 2016
First Look

December 6, 2016

American economic development, Slavery's Capitalism identifies slavery as the primary force driving key innovations in entrepreneurship, finance, accounting, management, and political economy that are too... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

19 Jan 2017
News

Here’s What Trump Doesn’t Get About American Manufacturing

November 2021 (Revised January 2024)
Case

The Global Great Depression, 1929-1939

By: Alberto Cavallo, Sophus A. Reinert and Federica Gabrieli

The Great Depression was, by far, the worst economic contraction of the twentieth century, and some of the most important ideas about both fiscal and monetary policy in the second half of the century were developed in response to it. The economic collapse, which... View Details

Keywords: Great Depression; Economic Conditions; Unemployment; Homelessness; Financial Crisis; History; Economy; Policy; Poverty; Social Issues; Economic Slowdown and Stagnation

August 2008
Article

Ethnic Scientific Communities and International Technology Diffusion

By: William R. Kerr

This study explores the importance of knowledge transfer for international technology diffusion by examining ethnic scientific and entrepreneurial communities in the US and their ties to their home countries. US ethnic research communities are quantified by applying an... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Ethnicity; Production; Integration; Knowledge Sharing; Patents; Employment; Performance Productivity; Entrepreneurship; Change; Developing Countries and Economies; Immigration; China; United States

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November 2012
Case

Occupy Wall Street

By: Rakesh Khurana and Eric Baldwin

This case examines the Occupy Wall Street movement, which emerged in late 2011 in response to the fallout from the global financial crisis of 2008 and the economic downturn that followed. Occupy Wall Street was born out of a sense of frustration with both a global... View Details

Keywords: Occupy Wall Street; Organizational Behavior; Income Inequality; Democracy; Financial Crisis; Campaign Finance; Globalization; Globalized Economies and Regions; Mission and Purpose; Organizational Culture

September 2011 (Revised March 2014)
Case

Liberia

By: Eric Werker and Jasmina Beganovic

From 1989 to 2003 civil war raged in Liberia, causing GDP per capita to drop an unprecedented 90% from peak to trough. The roots of Liberia's conflict and economic decline are complex and intertwined, resting on over a century of discriminatory elite rule and twisted... View Details

Keywords: War; Developing Countries and Economies; Financial Crisis; Government and Politics; Macroeconomics; Liberia

Michael Porter is an economist, researcher, author, advisor, speaker and teacher. Throughout his career at Harvard Business School, he has brought economic theory and strategy concepts to bear on many of the most challenging problems facing corporations, economies... View Details

Keywords: biotechnology; e-commerce industry; health care; information; information technology industry; internet; nonprofit industry; service industry; state government

Dec 2019
Survey

A Recovery Squandered

Despite a decade of steady economic growth since the Great Recession, America has done remarkably little to address underlying structural weaknesses in the country’s economy and society. Surveys of HBS alumni worldwide, HBS MBA students,... View Details

15 Sep 2014
News

The U.S. is Returning to Iraq, But What About Libya?

April 2011 (Revised February 2016)
Case

Jamaica's Anemic Growth: The IMF, China and the Debt(th) Trap

By: Rafael Di Tella and Natalie Kindred

This case describes the economic development problems faced by the small Caribbean-island country of Jamaica over most of the past half-century. The Jamaican economy showed relatively strong growth in the 1960s but stagnated in the 1970s. By the end of that decade,... View Details

Keywords: Government Administration; Economic Slowdown and Stagnation; International Finance; Crime and Corruption; Poverty; Private Sector; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Economy; Developing Countries and Economies; Borrowing and Debt; Jamaica

October 2003 (Revised January 2004)
Case

The 2001 Crisis in Argentina: An IMF-Sponsored Default? (A)

By: Rafael M. Di Tella and Ingrid Vogel

At the end of 2001, Argentina's economy and society both appeared on the verge of collapse. Furious about controls imposed on the convertibility of their bank deposits into cash (the "corralito") and huge proposed government spending cuts amidst high unemployment and... View Details

Keywords: Financial Crisis; Economic Slowdown and Stagnation; Banks and Banking; Problems and Challenges; Decision Choices and Conditions; Currency Exchange Rate; Economy; Government Administration; Crime and Corruption; Argentina

December 2004 (Revised August 2006)
Case

Brcko and the Arizona Market

By: Bruce R. Scott and Edward Murphy

Explores the role of the U.S. military in facilitating the establishment of a spectacularly successful free trade area in one of the most devastated areas of Bosnia. NATO's imposition of law and order, plus protection from local political protection rackets, led to... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Trade; Economic Growth; Industry Growth; Government Legislation; Emerging Markets; Bosnia and Hercegovina; United States

19 Oct 2022
News

The Mess in Los Angeles Points to Trouble for Democrats

22 Aug 2017
News

Corporate Responsibility In The Age Of Trump

May–June 2015
Article

Dead Weight: How Greece Wound up Trapped in the European Union

By: Debora L. Spar

In the early 1990s, Greece fell far afield of the economic criteria laid out by the Maastricht Treaty, the EU's founding document. In 1999, when the European monetary union was launched, Greece failed to meet the criteria again, but managed to squeeze into the body two... View Details

Keywords: EU; Geopolitics; Economic Conditions; Economy; Financial Crisis; Greece; European Union

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Research Summary

Principal Research Interests

My research is principally focused on nineteenth- and twentieth-century subjects, with an emphasis on economic and especially financial history. I am interested in the role of banks and capital markets in the process of economic development as well as in the political... View Details

2021
Working Paper

Capitalism, Slavery, and the Legacy of Cesare Beccaria

By: Sophus A. Reinert

The Milanese Marquis Cesare Beccaria (1738-1794) dedicated his life first to theorizing a more just and equal society grounded in individual rights, anchored in secular political economy rather than in religious dogma, then to realizing this bold vision... View Details

Keywords: Slavery; Racism; Capitalism; History; Society