Join Professor Peter Haegel and colleagues for the launch of his new book Billionaires in World Politics (Oxford University Press, 2020).
Schedule of Events:
Discussants:
Book Cover
In Billionaires in World Politics (Oxford University Press, 2020) Peter Hägel shows how the privatization of politics assumes a new dimension when billionaires wield power in world politics, and why this requires a re-thinking of individual agency in International Relations. Structural changes (globalization, neoliberalism, competition states, and global governance), he argues, have generated new opportunities for individuals to become extremely rich and to engage in politics across borders. Thus, Hägel conceptualizes political agency of billionaires in terms of capacities, goals, and power, while maintaining that this agency is contingent upon the specific political field a billionaire is trying to enter. In six case studies he explores the power of billionaires in their pursuit of security, wealth, and esteem. Finally, Hägel addresses three major questions: Is it more appropriate to see billionaires as 'super-actors', or as a global 'super-class'? What is the relative power of billionaires within the international system? What does the power of billionaires mean for the liberal norms of legitimate political order?
Registrants will receive the meeting information 24 hours prior to the start of the event.