Kevin Keller

Great piece, and highlights one of the strangest features of sovereign lending: that for some countries, nobody really expects (or wants) them to pay off their debts.

1/ Two really interesting recent pieces, both making a similar point: for at least a decade, things at universities haven't been going great. First (by @nilsgilman.bsky.social) is about AI: www.persuasion.community/p/the-multiv...

6/ If we want people to be able to read (I do), and we also think people deserve a chance to participate in guided learning as adults, if desired (I do), then we might need to think creatively about how to solve those specific problems, and not bundle them with "fix the whole university system."

1/ Two really interesting recent pieces, both making a similar point: for at least a decade, things at universities haven't been going great. First (by @nilsgilman.bsky.social) is about AI: www.persuasion.community/p/the-multiv...

4/ It's true that, unlike today, people lacked the tools to "pretend" to do good work. But that doesn't mean they put in the effort to actually "do" good work. They just did bad work.

1/ Two really interesting recent pieces, both making a similar point: for at least a decade, things at universities haven't been going great. First (by @nilsgilman.bsky.social) is about AI: www.persuasion.community/p/the-multiv...

2/ Second (by Ann Manov) is about the spread of "civic centers": harpers.org/archive/2026...

1/ More developments on the elusive contracts for the Standard Gauge Rail! This is especially interesting right now, as a lot of discussion on law + China/Africa focuses on the recent cancellation of RightsCon in Lusaka.

2/ What stands out to me is this: access to Chinese capital has set off an intense fight in Kenya about whether (and how) to use that capital--and more broadly, about what kind of legal system is conducive to growth. Government transparency is part of that larger debate.

Delighted to be part of this list! My paper "The World Bank and the Origins of Chinese State Capitalism," is forthcoming in the Berkeley Journal of International Law. Getting to the draft requires a lot of clicking around, so I thought I'd pull out my most widely relevant arguments here. 1/9

9(2)/ It also appears in many of the forthcoming pieces highlighted in this blog post. To me, it is one reason why international LPE is an exciting avenue for future research.

Delighted to be part of this list! My paper "The World Bank and the Origins of Chinese State Capitalism," is forthcoming in the Berkeley Journal of International Law. Getting to the draft requires a lot of clicking around, so I thought I'd pull out my most widely relevant arguments here. 1/9

8(2)/ To understand political-economic developments in one country (e.g., the bipartisan turn to "industrial policy" in the United States, or Trump's acquisition of a "golden share" in U.S. Steel), it is helpful to look at global circuits of material and intellectual exchange.

Delighted to be part of this list! My paper "The World Bank and the Origins of Chinese State Capitalism," is forthcoming in the Berkeley Journal of International Law. Getting to the draft requires a lot of clicking around, so I thought I'd pull out my most widely relevant arguments here. 1/9

7/ Necessary caveat: this is one small strand of a gigantic story! And there's more nuance in the article.

Delighted to be part of this list! My paper "The World Bank and the Origins of Chinese State Capitalism," is forthcoming in the Berkeley Journal of International Law. Getting to the draft requires a lot of clicking around, so I thought I'd pull out my most widely relevant arguments here. 1/9

6(1)/ The second was the overwhelming confidence that many political and economic leaders (across the world) felt about the future of neoliberalism.

Delighted to be part of this list! My paper "The World Bank and the Origins of Chinese State Capitalism," is forthcoming in the Berkeley Journal of International Law. Getting to the draft requires a lot of clicking around, so I thought I'd pull out my most widely relevant arguments here. 1/9

5(1)/ The first was the unique position of China in the 1980s and 1990s. A huge country, with a huge number of potential workers and consumers, suddenly transformed from a vocal critic of the US-led economic order to a willing participant.

Delighted to be part of this list! My paper "The World Bank and the Origins of Chinese State Capitalism," is forthcoming in the Berkeley Journal of International Law. Getting to the draft requires a lot of clicking around, so I thought I'd pull out my most widely relevant arguments here. 1/9

3/ Who cares? Aside from law+development people, I think the episode helps us tackle a larger question. As recently as the 2000s, neoliberalism was a globally dominant mode of economic policy-making. Over the past decade, we've seen a global turn to "state capitalism" or "industrial policy." Why?

Delighted to be part of this list! My paper "The World Bank and the Origins of Chinese State Capitalism," is forthcoming in the Berkeley Journal of International Law. Getting to the draft requires a lot of clicking around, so I thought I'd pull out my most widely relevant arguments here. 1/9

Terrific piece. Must add the latest book from @seanvanatta.bsky.social and @petercontibrown.bsky.social to my reading list.

Fascinating piece by Yuen Yuen Ang -- that our current moment is not a "polycrisis," but a "polytunity."

I especially agree on the need to reject two premises that prop up a lot of research and programming: (i) that societies behave like machines, and (ii) that approaches that "worked" in the US or Europe should be applied elsewhere.

How did Chinese state-owned enterprises become some of the world's largest corporations? My latest paper (finally posted on SSRN!) tackles the question.

This is obviously one piece of a very large puzzle. But it's an interesting piece. It improves our understanding of how the global economy worked during the era of "neoliberalism," and it suggests new reasons for the current global turn to state capitalism.

How did Chinese state-owned enterprises become some of the world's largest corporations? My latest paper (finally posted on SSRN!) tackles the question.