A History of Big Recessions in the Long Twentieth Century

This book examines the array of financial crises, slumps, depressions and recessions that happened around the globe during the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. It covers events including World War I, hyperinflation and market crashes in the 1920s, the Great Depression of the 1930s, stagflation of the 1970s, the Latin American debt crises of the 1980s, the post-socialist transitions in Central Eastern Europe and Russia in the 1990s, and the great financial crisis of 2008?9. In addition to providing wide geographic and historical coverage of episodes of crisis in North America, Europe, Latin America and Asia, the book clarifies basic concepts in the area of recession economics, analysis of high inflation, debt crises, political cycles and international political economy. An understanding of these concepts is needed to comprehend big recessions and slumps that often lead to both political change and the reassessment of prevailing economic paradigms.

1. Introduction; 2. Recessions and depressions: an overview of theories and empirics; 3. World War I, hyperinflation in the 1920s and World War II; 4. The Great Depression of the 1930s; 5. Stagflation in the 1970s, globalization and the financial crisis of 2008–9; 6. Two depressions in the early twenty-first century: the cases of Latvia and Greece; 7. Soviet-type of socialism and the post-socialist transition; 8. Economic crises in Latin America and East Asia; 9. Synthesis and interpretation.

Andrés Solimano is Founder and Chairman of the International Center for Globalization and Development (CIGLOB). His most recent books include Global Capitalism in Disarray: Inequality, Debt, and Austerity (2017); Pensiones a la Chilena (2017); Economic Elites, Crises, and Democracy (2014); and International Migration in the Age of Crisis and Globalization (Cambridge, 2010).