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All Outputs (49)

Climate change governance by central banks in an era of interlocking crises (2025)
Journal Article
Best, J., Paterson, M., Alami, I., Bailey, D., Bracking, S., Green, J., Helleiner, E., Jackson, J., Langley, P., Maechler, S., Morris, J., Quorning, S., Roberts, A., van ’t Klooster, J., Watt, R., & Wilshire, S. (online). Climate change governance by central banks in an era of interlocking crises. Environmental Politics, 1-27. https://doi.org/10.1080/09644016.2025.2481713

In this article, we survey the literature on central bank action on climate change, focusing particularly on how the combined crises of COVID-19, inflation, and Ukraine have affected this action. We argue that the current situation is a critical junc... Read More about Climate change governance by central banks in an era of interlocking crises.

Playful finance: Gamification and intermediation in FinTech economies (2023)
Journal Article
Lai, K. P., & Langley, P. (2024). Playful finance: Gamification and intermediation in FinTech economies. Geoforum, 151, Article 103848. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2023.103848

This paper examines how digital gamification techniques, which incorporate video gaming elements (rather than full-fledged games) into apps, are reshaping the logics and practices of intermediation that are core to FinTech economies. First, we argue... Read More about Playful finance: Gamification and intermediation in FinTech economies.

FinTech platform regulation: Regulating with/against platforms in the United Kingdom and China (2023)
Journal Article
Langley, P., & Leyshon, A. (2023). FinTech platform regulation: Regulating with/against platforms in the United Kingdom and China. Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, 16(2), 257–268. https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad005

This paper develops case studies of the United Kingdom (UK) and China to analyse divergent national financial regulatory approaches to FinTech as a novel political economy of platforms. Regulating with platforms is core to the approach taken in the U... Read More about FinTech platform regulation: Regulating with/against platforms in the United Kingdom and China.

Nigel Dodd: An appreciation (2023)
Journal Article
Langley, P., Ashenden, S., Barry, A., Bear, L., Kelly, A., McGoey, L. J., Molyneux, M., Neyland, D., Parry, B., Tonkiss, F., & Weszkalnys, G. (2023). Nigel Dodd: An appreciation. Economy and Society, 52(1), 1-8. https://doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2023.2157584

Professor Nigel Dodd was a long-standing and much-loved member of the Editorial Board of Economy and Society. He sadly passed away in August 2022. In this short piece, we express our heartfelt gratitude for Nigel’s contributions to the journal and br... Read More about Nigel Dodd: An appreciation.

Neo-colonial credit: FinTech platforms in Africa (2022)
Journal Article
Langley, P., & Leyshon, A. (2022). Neo-colonial credit: FinTech platforms in Africa. Journal of Cultural Economy, 15(4), 401-415. https://doi.org/10.1080/17530350.2022.2028652

This paper makes a three-fold contribution to social science research into FinTech in Africa. First, we build on existing research into mobile payments to show how FinTech providers offer unsecured short-term credit products via mobile wallets. Secon... Read More about Neo-colonial credit: FinTech platforms in Africa.

FinTech in Africa: An Editorial Introduction (2022)
Journal Article
Langley, P., & Rodima-Taylor, D. (2022). FinTech in Africa: An Editorial Introduction. Journal of Cultural Economy, 15(4), 387-400. https://doi.org/10.1080/17530350.2022.2092193

Applications of digital technologies to retail money and finance have gathered pace across the globe over the last decade or so, constituting novel ‘FinTech’ economies. Although FinTech is registering across critical social scientific research, insuf... Read More about FinTech in Africa: An Editorial Introduction.

Interrogating ‘urban social innovation’: relationality and urban change in Berlin (2021)
Journal Article
McFarlane, C., Langley, P., Lewis, S., Painter, J., & Vradis, A. (2023). Interrogating ‘urban social innovation’: relationality and urban change in Berlin. Urban Geography, 44(2), 337-357. https://doi.org/10.1080/02723638.2021.2003586

The relationship between the city and ‘innovation’ is long and varied, but in recent years there has been a new focus on the potential of innovation to catalyse economic, social, and environmental change. This has led to a debate around whether and h... Read More about Interrogating ‘urban social innovation’: relationality and urban change in Berlin.

Decarbonizing capital: Investment, divestment and the qualification of carbon assets (2021)
Journal Article
Langley, P., Bridge, G., Bulkeley, H., & van Veelen, B. (2021). Decarbonizing capital: Investment, divestment and the qualification of carbon assets. Economy and Society, 50(3), 494-516. https://doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2021.1860335

rivate investment capital is now widely regarded as strategically significant to the governance of climate change. A dedicated and dynamic carbon finance sector has emerged that features techniques and practices for decarbonizing capital, facilitatin... Read More about Decarbonizing capital: Investment, divestment and the qualification of carbon assets.

Economy and society in COVID times (2021)
Journal Article
Langley, P. (2021). Economy and society in COVID times. Economy and Society, 50(2), 149-157. https://doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2021.1900653

The Editorial Board of Economy and Society has assembled a virtual collection of 12 free access papers to mark a very significant anniversary – Volume 50 of the journal is being published during 2021. This overview explains the rationale for the coll... Read More about Economy and society in COVID times.

Impact investors: The ethical financialization of development, society and nature (2020)
Book Chapter
Langley, P. (2021). Impact investors: The ethical financialization of development, society and nature. In J. Knox-Hayes, & D. Wojcik (Eds.), Routledge handbook of financial geography. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781351119061

With increasing numbers of investors rejecting the notion that they face a binary choice between investing for maximum risk-adjusted returns or donating for social purpose, the impact investment market is at a significant turning point as it enters t... Read More about Impact investors: The ethical financialization of development, society and nature.

Assets and assetization in financialized capitalism (2020)
Journal Article
Langley, P. (2021). Assets and assetization in financialized capitalism. Review of International Political Economy, 28(2), 382-393. https://doi.org/10.1080/09692290.2020.1830828

In the wake of the global financial crisis of 2007–09, political economists have typically identified and interrogated speculative logics and credit-debt relations as the markers of financialized capitalism. This paper argues that assets, and the con... Read More about Assets and assetization in financialized capitalism.

Central banks: Climate governors of last resort? (2020)
Journal Article
Langley, P., & Morris, J. H. (2020). Central banks: Climate governors of last resort?. Environment and Planning A, 52(8), 1471-1479. https://doi.org/10.1177/0308518x20951809

The global and regional leadership of central banks in response to the COVID-19 pandemic has heightened public and political debates over their role in the governance of an arguably more fundamental planetary crisis: the climate crisis. Strategically... Read More about Central banks: Climate governors of last resort?.

Crowdfunding cities: Social entrepreneurship, speculation and solidarity in Berlin (2020)
Journal Article
Langley, P., Lewis, S., McFarlane, C., Painter, J., & Vradis, A. (2020). Crowdfunding cities: Social entrepreneurship, speculation and solidarity in Berlin. Geoforum, 115, 11-20. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2020.06.014

Situated at the intersection of urban and economic geography, this paper develops and illustrates a three-step research agenda to further critical understanding of relations between crowdfunding and cities. First, we explore how crowdfunding is enrol... Read More about Crowdfunding cities: Social entrepreneurship, speculation and solidarity in Berlin.

The platform political economy of FinTech: Reintermediation, consolidation and capitalisation (2020)
Journal Article
Langley, P., & Leyshon, A. (2021). The platform political economy of FinTech: Reintermediation, consolidation and capitalisation. New Political Economy, 26(3), 376-388. https://doi.org/10.1080/13563467.2020.1766432

‘FinTech’ is the digital sector of retail money and finance widely proclaimed to be transforming banking in the global North and ‘banking the unbanked’ in the global South. This paper develops a perspective for critically understanding FinTech as a p... Read More about The platform political economy of FinTech: Reintermediation, consolidation and capitalisation.

The financialization of life (2020)
Book Chapter
Langley, P. (2020). The financialization of life. In P. Mader, D. Mertens, & N. van der Zwan (Eds.), The Routledge international handbook of financialization. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315142876-6

The purpose of this chapter is to elaborate upon financialization research that draws on the post-structural theorizations of contemporary power relations provided by Michel Foucault and Gilles Deleuze. The intertwined theoretical projects of Foucaul... Read More about The financialization of life.

Affective Life and Cultural Economy: Payday Loans and the Everyday Space-Times of Credit-Debt in the UK (2019)
Journal Article
Anderson, B., Langley, P., Ash, J., & Gordon, R. (2020). Affective Life and Cultural Economy: Payday Loans and the Everyday Space-Times of Credit-Debt in the UK. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 45(2), 420-433. https://doi.org/10.1111/tran.12355

Analysing the affective geographies of digitally mediated payday loans in the UK, this paper advocates and exemplifies an approach to cultural economy that focuses on how economic worlds are affectively animated and lived. Supplementing the two versi... Read More about Affective Life and Cultural Economy: Payday Loans and the Everyday Space-Times of Credit-Debt in the UK.

Pluralizing and Problematizing Carbon Finance (2019)
Journal Article
Bridge, G., Bulkeley, H., Langley, P., & van Veelen, B. (2020). Pluralizing and Problematizing Carbon Finance. Progress in Human Geography, 44(4), 724-742. https://doi.org/10.1177/0309132519856260

Growing emphasis on finance as key to decarbonization requires social science research that critically attends to the emergent and diverse forms taken by carbon finance. First, we pluralize research into carbon finance, building on existing work to i... Read More about Pluralizing and Problematizing Carbon Finance.

Indebted life and money culture: Payday lending in the United Kingdom (2019)
Journal Article
Langley, P., Anderson, B., Ash, J., & Gordon, R. (2019). Indebted life and money culture: Payday lending in the United Kingdom. Economy and Society, 48(1), 30-51. https://doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2018.1554371

Critical social scientific research holds that credit–debt is a principal economic and governing relation in contemporary economy and society, but largely neglects money’s role in indebted life. Drawing on qualitative research in the payday loan mark... Read More about Indebted life and money culture: Payday lending in the United Kingdom.

Frontier financialization: Urban infrastructure in the United Kingdom (2018)
Journal Article
Langley, P. (2018). Frontier financialization: Urban infrastructure in the United Kingdom. Economic Anthropology, 5(2), 172-184. https://doi.org/10.1002/sea2.12115

This article contributes to critical social scientific understanding of the significance of state power to the furtherance of the financialization of socioeconomic life. Drawing on the poststructural theories of power of Gilles Deleuze and Michel Fou... Read More about Frontier financialization: Urban infrastructure in the United Kingdom.