Meet the Editors

Emma Greeson is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Sociology at the University of California, San Diego. Her dissertation is a multi-sited ethnography along the value chain for used clothing between the United Kingdom and Poland that examines how value is produced for a highly heterogeneous product. The research examines where value is produced (in which spaces and social configurations), what exactly is being valued in various socio-material relations (the material and symbolic transformations accompanying valuation), and how the value chain is made and maintained (through which material, moral, and relational practices). This dissertation contextualizes existing accounts of valuation, offers a material and pragmatic account of valuation that can account for valuation of highly heterogeneous goods, and proposes a relational ontology of economic processes. Emma holds an MA in Central and Eastern European Studies from the Jagiellonian University (Krakow, Poland); her earlier research dealt with language policy and nationalism in Europe.

Georg Rilinger is a PhD student in the Department of Sociology at the University of Chicago. His dissertation combines archival research with in-depth interviews and network analysis to study the processes surrounding the creation of electricity markets in California and the PJM regions. The project seeks to understand under what political, regulatory, and material conditions the market designs provided by economists can be implemented successfully and under what conditions they fail. While the California markets became susceptible to gaming and failed catastrophically in 2001, the PJM markets continue to operate effectively. What explains the successful design and implementation in one case and failure in the other? In pursuing this question, Georg is particularly interested in explaining how the structural conditions for systemic market 'gaming' emerged and persisted in California while PJM managed to resolve them. The project speaks to recent debates in economic sociology that examine the role of economic knowledge in regulatory and political processes as well as debates in criminology that discuss the conditions under which 'criminogenic environments' emerge. His earlier research utilized network analysis and archival research to examine the structure and perception of a corporate conspiracy in 1930s Chicago.

Ruggero Gambacurta-Scopello is a PhD candidate in Political Science at Sciences Po – Paris, under the supervision of professor Patrick Le Galès. His PhD dissertation, entitled The State and the Politics of Economic Emergence in Brazil: The Case of BNDES (1985-2016), deals with the transformations of Brazilian capitalism in the last 30 years. His research uses mixed methods to focus on the activities of the Brazilian Development Bank. Ruggero had professional experiences at the Directorate for Education and Skills at the OECD, and also at UNESCO and Le Monde. He earned a Master’s degree in Political Science at Sciences Po Paris in 2014.

Agatha Anna Slupek is a doctoral student in Political Science at the University of Chicago. She holds a BA (Hons) in Philosophy from McGill University. Her research interests are in feminist theory, critical social theory, the political economy of advanced industrial societies, and the rhetorical dimensions of political discourse. Her dissertation, tentatively entitled “The Political Futures of Feminism, Work, and Welfare,” will consider the impact of gender inequalities and 20th century economic and institutional changes on the liberal ideal of democratic citizenship. She is currently a Doctoral Exchange Fellow at Sciences Po – Paris.

Anne EA van der Graaf is a Doctoral Fellow at MaxPo, specializing in financial risk management by insurance companies and banks. Her dissertation, entitled Framing Financial Risk: What Does Risk Management Manage?, is based on ethnographic fieldwork in finance. She has carried out two participant observations, one in the market risk management of a European bank in long term liquidation, and another in the life and financial risk department of a large European insurance company. Aside from her research on finance, she is interested in gender studies, the relationship between state and economic actors, accounting, and organization studies. Before joining MaxPo in 2013 she finished her MSc in Research Sociology at the University of Edinburgh. She has two Bachelors' degrees from Erasmus University Rotterdam, one in sociology and another in econometrics and operational research.