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Sociology of financial markets
Monday 14:45-16:45
Room: 907 - 9, rue de la chaise - 75007 Paris
Financial markets have become a central institution of market societies but remain obscure. Courses on finance and financial markets are generally devoted to technical dimensions such as option pricing, asset allocation or valuation of assets. The ambition of the Sociology of financial markets class is to consider financial markets also as a human institution, with its history, its hierarchies, its various forms of rationality, its set of norms and beliefs, its social networks, its cognitive categories or its labor market. Analyzing the concrete day to day functioning of the financial markets is crucial not only for understanding this specific institution but also for understanding the logics that are diffusing beyond. Hence, financial markets are at the forefront of new forms of capitalism and constitute therefore an excellent observatory of their development.
The course will build bridges between concrete examples of financial markets, recent advances in the emerging field of sociology of financial markets and classical studies in economic sociology.
The course will be of great value for all students interested or attracted by financial markets, either as a possible option for a professional career, as a matter of political concern, or as an exciting topic of scientific study.
Students are invited to read one scientific article each week and to work more specifically on three articles on which they will write three memos that they will send to the professor. 1) One of the three memos will be three “powerpoint” slides which isolate the key points (either theoretical or empirical) of the demonstration of the article, 2) a second memo will be a one page report showing how the article relates to previous literature (and especially to other approaches presented during the class) and 3) a third memo will be a one page report devoted to criticize (negatively or positively) the article. The professor will organize a discussion based on students’ memos. All students are expected to participate to the general discussion.
Validation will be based on the three short reports (20% each) and on general participation.
1. 2 September 2019. Introduction Historical approach of financial markets
Organization of the seminar
Material for lecture:
Carruthers, Bruce G. 1999. City of capital: Politics and markets in the English financial revolution. Princeton University Press.
2. 9 September 2019. Financialization and the transformation of the firms
Debated article:
Pernell, Kim, Jiwook Jung, and Frank Dobbin. 2017. “The hazards of expert control: chief risk officers and risky derivatives.” American Sociological Review82.3 (2017): 511-541.
Material for lecture:
Godechot, Olivier. 2016. “Financialization is marketization! A study on the respective impact of various dimensions of financialization on the increase in global inequality”, Sociological Science 3: 495-519.
Dobbin, Frank and Jiwook Jung. 2016. “Agency Theory as Prophecy: How Boards, Analysts, and Fund Managers Perform Their Roles”,Seattle University Law Review39: 291–320.
In French:Godechot, Olivier. 2015. « Variétés de financiarisation et accroissement des inégalités », Revue Française de Socio-Economie 16: 51-72.
3. 16 September 2019. The financial labor market: exogenous and endogenous social hierarchies
Debated article:
Blair-Loy, Mary. 2001. “Cultural constructions of family schemas: The case of women finance executives.” Gender & Society15(5): 687-709.
Material for lecture:
Roth, Louise-Marie. 2006. Selling Women Short. Gender Inequality on Wall Street, Princeton University Press
Godechot, Olivier. 2008. “"Hold-up" in finance: the conditions of possibility for high bonuses in the financial industry”, Revue française de sociologie, 49 Supplement Annual English Edition: 95-123.
In French:Godechot, Olivier. 2006. « Hold-up en finance. Les conditions de possibilité des bonus élevés dans l'industrie financière », Revue française de sociologie, 47 (2): 341-371.
4. 23 September 2019. Rationalities of the market. Performativity of theories and social backgrounds
Debated article:
Svetlova, Ekaterina. 2012. “On the performative power of financial models.” Economy and Society41(3): 418-434.
Material for lecture:
MacKenzie, Donald and Yuval Millo. 2003. “Constructing a market, performing theory: the historical sociology of a financial derivatives exchange,” American journal of sociology109 (1). 107-145.
In French:MacKenzie, Donald and Yuval Millo. 2003. « Construction d'un marché et performation théorique : sociologie historique d'une bourse de produits dérivés financiers », Réseaux,21(122): p. 15-61.
Godechot, Olivier. 2016. “Back in the Bazaar. Taking Pierre Bourdieu to a Trading Room”, Journal of Cultural Economy 9(4): 410-429.
5. 30 September 2019. Cognitive and social embeddedness : Financial categories and social networks
Debated article:
Yenkey, Christopher B. 2018. “The outsider’s advantage: Distrust as a deterrent to exploitation.” American Journal of Sociology124(3): 613-663.
Material for lecture:
Baker, Wayne. 1984. “The Social Structure of a National Securities Market”, American Journal of Sociology 89(4): 775-811.
In French:Baker, Wayne. 2005. “La structure sociale d’un marché à la criée”, Idees, n° 139, mars 2005, 56-69 & Idees, n° 140, juin 2005, 58-68.
Zuckerman, Ezra W. 1999. « The Categorical Imperative: Securities Analysts and the Illegitimacy Discount », American Journal of Sociology104 (5): 1398-1438.
6. 6 October 2019. Crisis and regulation
Debated article:
Kalaitzake, Manolis. 2017. “Death by a thousand cuts? Financial political power and the case of the European financial transaction tax.” New Political Economy22(6): 709-726.
Material for lecture:
MacKenzie, Donald. 2011. “The Credit Crisis as a Problem in the Sociology of Knowledge”, American Journal of Sociology116(6): 1778-1841.
Woll, Cornelia. 2014. The Power of Inaction. Bank Bailouts in Comparison, Duke University Press.
This course is suspended during the 2020-2021 academid year.
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