Campus Directory

Pronouns he/him

Division Social Sciences Division

Department/College/Unit Sociology Department

Title Director of Community Studies

Affiliation Faculty

Other UCSC Campus Affiliation Community Studies Program

Faculty Type Regular Faculty

Areas of Expertise Social Theory
Political Theory
Capitalism
Democracy
Community Studies
Class
Personal and Social Identities
Labor and Social Movements
Finance

Web Site

Primary Office Location Rachel Carson College Academic Building
336

Mail Stop Rachel Carson College Faculty Services

Biography, Education and Training

2021-23, Berggruen Institute Research Fellow, University of Southern California

2014, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies, Cologne, Germany

2013 PhD Sociology, New York University

2005 BA Sociology (Political Science minor), University of California, Los Angeles

2003 AA Sociology, Fullerton College

Summary of Expertise

A critical sociologist who blurs the lines between community activism and social theory, my work explores the past and possible futures of radical economic democracy.

My first book, Dismantling Solidarity: Capitalist Politics and American Pensions since the New Deal (Cornell University Press, 2017), analyzes past failures to achieve economic democracy in the US. It draws upon decades of archival sources to show why America’s modern retirement system was financialized and efforts by workers to control pension finance collectively, undermined by the state. It was awarded the Paul Sweezy Award and was given an honorable mention for the Labor and Labor Movements Award, both through the American Sociological Association.

The Master’s Tools: How Finance Wrecked Democracy (and a Radical Plan to Rebuild It), my current book project, is forthcoming with Verso Books in January 2025. It develops a conjunctural theory of democratic ruptures, showing how democracy is intertwined with and eroded by financial institutions. It argues that finance’s domination of politics can be subverted by new democratic financial institutions rooted in the working-class demos. Through my work with community organizations, the book designs a governance system for public investment in which small groups of randomly selected participants and issue-based commissions set mandates for investment through deliberation. I argue, drawing from Audre Lorde, that such agonistic institutions will create “polarities between which our creativity can spark.”

I also have a series of ongoing and interconnected projects on class, identity and emancipatory politics. The most recent publication is an article titled “The Problem of Class Abstractionism,” which I wrote with Mathieu Hikaru Desan. It articulates a theory that integrates the dynamic properties of capitalism into the analysis of class and social differences, such as race, citizenship, gender and sexuality for understanding emancipatory movements. Much of the work in this vein aims to go “Beyond Abstractionism,” to develop conjunctural concepts and tools for understanding emancipation. I have two book projects in the works that develop these theoretical themes at different registers.

With Public Bank Los Angeles, I helped write policy reports supporting the creation of a democratic public bank in Los Angeles. This led me to consult on The Public Banking Act of 2023, which was introduced to Congress by Congresswomen Rashida Tlaib and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. This work is key to my critical social theory. The democratic designs for finance in my forthcoming book both resulted from and contributed to it. Currently, I am a Corporate Power fellow at the Roosevelt Institute and an Economic Institutions fellow at the Paris-based institute for democratic innovation, DemocracyNext, where I am developing these ideas in new policy directions.

Finally, my work is published in journals such as Annual Review of Sociology, Critical Historical Studies, Politics & Society, and Socio-Economic Review. I am also the Senior Associate Editor of the journal Critical Sociology.

Research Interests

Social Theory, Capitalism, Community, Class Formation, Finance, Political Economy, Emancipatory Politics, Identity, Labor, Philosophy of Social Science

Teaching Interests

Theories of Emancipation, Capitalism, Community, Critical Social Theory, Marxian Social Theory

Selected Publications

2025 The Master’s Tools: How Finance Wrecked Democracy (and a Radical Plan to Rebuild It). Verso Books.

2020 Rethinking Class and Social Difference. Emerald Publishing. Political Power & Social Theory Series: 37 (edited with Barry Eidlin).

2017 Dismantling Solidarity: Capitalist Politics and American Pensions since the New Deal. Cornell University Press. ILR Imprint.