25 March 2025

Sara Stevano, senior lecturer at SOAS Department of Economics, in conversation with Surbhi Kesar, explores the concept of social reproduction as a critical lens for understanding economic activities, particularly in the Global South.

Sara Stevano argues that social reproduction encompasses all work necessary to maintain life, including paid and unpaid labor, care work, and social rituals. Drawing on her research in Mozambique, she demonstrates how traditional economic analyses fail to capture the complex realities of work and survival in peripheral economies. The discussion highlights the importance of recognising social reproduction as a fundamental aspect of economic processes, not just a peripheral consideration. Ultimately, the episode calls for a feminist political economy approach that centers the everyday experiences of workers in understanding economic development.

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Surbhi Kesar, lecturer at SOAS Department of Economics, in conversation with Sara Stevano, provides a comprehensive analysis of the informal economy, challenging traditional economic development theories by demonstrating how postcolonial economies persistently reproduce informal economic structures.

Her research, primarily focused on India, reveals a complex landscape of economic flux characterised by precarity, limited upward mobility, and systemic exclusion. By examining the historical and contemporary dynamics of informality, Kesar argues that current economic growth models fail to address the fundamental structural challenges faced by workers in the Global South.

Her work highlights the need to understand informality not as a temporary phase, but as a critical component of contemporary capitalist reproduction.

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9 January 2024

'How might the lessons of history inform our choices in the present? Does a rules-based world order risk concealing informed discussions, potentially blurring the line between assumptions and reality?

In a world shadowed by its history, Gilbert Achcar, professor at SOAS Development Studies as he discusses his latest book with Karabekir Akkoyunlu, lecturer at SOAS, he urges us to transcend the rhetoric and slogans of blame when examining contemporary issues - from the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine to the tense Taiwan standoff with China, and the evolving power dynamics between the US, Russia and China in between. Instead Achcar’s analysis of the present political tensions challenged us to transcend the ‘black and white debate’, and unravel the nuances of policy decisions taken at critical junctions, dynamics present in the global structure, and the psychological dimensions shaping this social fabric. By offering us a manual crafted by past lessons, Achcar’s “New Cold War” is a call to take inspiration from how existing institutions like the UN were forged and wield this knowledge to navigate the complex political landscape for a more sustainable path. Achcar’s hopefulness resonates throughout, taking a firm belief that another world was and still is possible.'

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