Plenary II: Political Economy, Activism and Alternative Economic Strategies Outside Europe
Peter Alexander
Marikana: a turning point in South African history?
Peter Alexander is professor of sociology at the University of Johannesburg and holds the South African Research Chair in Social Change. His PhD is from London University and previous academic positions were at Oxford University and Rhodes University. He Is co-author of the recently published Marikana: A View from the Mountain and a Case to Answer (2012) and Class in Soweto (2013). Previous books include Racism, Resistance and Revolution (1986), Workers, War and the Origins of Apartheid (2000), Classifying Race, Racializing Class (2000) and Globalization and new Identities (2005). His main project at the moment is on South Africa’s Rebellion of the Poor.
Yuezhi Zhao
Struggling for Socialism in China: Elite and Popular Dynamics after the “Chongqing Model”
Dr. Yuezhi Zhao is Associate Director, Professor and Canada Research Chair in Political Economy of Global Communication at the School of Communication, Simon Fraser University, Canada. She is also the Changjiang Chair Professor and founding Director of the Institute for Political Economy of Communication at the Communication University of China, Beijing. Dr. Zhao has written extensively in both English and Chinese on the political economic and socio-cultural dimensions of China’s rapidly transforming communication system and the role of communication in China’s global integration. Her publications include Communication in China: Political Economy, Power, and Conflict (2008).
Federico Fuentes
Venezuela’s twenty-first century socialism: neo-developmentalism
or anti-capitalist alternative?
Federico Fuentes edits Bolivia Rising, is part of the Venezuelanalysis.com editorial collective, and a regular contributor to Green Left Weekly, including as part of its Caracas bureau from 2007-10. During this time in Caracas he was based at the Fundación Centro Internacional Miranda as a resident researcher investigating 21st century political instruments and popular participation in public management. He has co-authored three books with Marta Harnecker on the new left in Bolivia, Ecuador, and Paraguay and is together with Roger Burbach and Michael Fox is a co-author of “Latin America’s Turbulent Transitions: the future of twenty-first century socialism” recently released by Zed Books.