The Palgrave Handbook of Political Economy (edited by Ivano Cardinale and Roberto Scazzieri)

The aim of this Handbook is to outline the field of political economy as the domain of the interdependencies between the objectives of individuals and groups within the polity and the internally structured constraints, posed by the material sphere, to the attainment of those objectives. This Handbook transcends the received dichotomy between political economy as an application of rational choice theory or as the study of the causes of material welfare, outlining a broader field of study that encompasses those traditions. The Handbook is divided into three parts. The first part (‘Foundations’) addresses the areas of social life underlying the provision of material needs through social coordination. The second part (‘Research Themes’) reassesses the fields of interaction between the economy and the polity on which political economy is built. The third part (‘Ways Ahead’) outlines a theory of political economy that brings together means-ends action and the material interdependencies underlying the provision of needs. The Handbook aims to provide new categories of analysis, which are grounded in the traditions of political economy and highlight its standing as a central component of social science.