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Dr Sean Irving

Sean

Lecturer in Modern British History

Email: s.irving@qmul.ac.uk
Room Number: Arts Two 3.04

Profile

I am a historian of political economy. I am particularly interested in how republican ideas have informed economic thought. I seek to recover and develop an economic republicanism that looks beyond the binaries of economic planning versus market competition. In my first monograph and related articles, I put forth a new interpretation of Hayek as a market republican employing the neo-Roman conception of liberty. In my current book project, Between Bosses and Bureaucrats: The Lost Tradition of Republican Political Economy, I show how republican ideas informed an anti-oligarchic strand of political economy over the 19th century. In addition to tracing this strand of thought, the book makes a theoretical contribution by placing these ideas within the republican conceptual framework of the mixed constitution. My analysis focuses specifically on issues of land and the environment, finance, welfare, and gender equality. I have plans to develop individual research projects in these areas, employing my framework of economic republicanism.

Teaching

HST4330 – Unravelling Britain: British History since 1801

HST5700 – Crime and Punishment in London

HST5901 – History Research Project

HST6738 – Making Thatcher's Britain: The Thatcher Revolution, 1975-1997

HST7901 – Mastering the Field

Research

Research Interests:

My research interests can be categorised into four interrelated fields of study:

  • The history of political economy and the concepts of ‘competition and competitiveness’
  • The Intellectual History of Neoliberalism and its relationship to Political Conservatism
  • The concept of the ‘Anglosphere’ and associated visions of global political economy
  • The Republican political tradition and its lessons for matters of power and ownership.

In addition to historical work, I am also engaged in debates about ‘liberty’ that take place on the terrain of political theory. This arises from my interest in republicanism. I also write about the history of cooperative enterprise and reflect on how common ownership can embody republican ideas of freedom and popular power in the world of work.

Publications

Monograph

  • Between Bosses and Bureaucrats: The Lost History of Republican Political Economy (Princeton University Press, under contract)
  • Hayek’s Market Republicanism: The Limits of Liberty (London: Routledge, 2020)

Journal Articles

  • ‘Republican Political Economy in Britain,1820-1840’, History of Political Economy, (forthcoming).

  • ‘Competitiveness, Civilizationism, and the Anglosphere: Kenneth Minogue’s Place in   Conservative Thought’, Modern Intellectual History 21:2 (2024), 469-488.

  • ‘Moral Economy in a Time of Polycrisis’, Global Perspectives 5:4 (2024). With Patrick Doyle
  • ‘Power, Plutocracy and Public Choice: James M. Buchanan, and the “Italian Tradition”’, Global Intellectual History 6:6 (2021), 956-976 
  • ‘Hayek’s Neo-Roman Liberalism’, European Journal of Political Theory 19:4 (2020), 553-570
  • ‘Limiting Democracy and Framing the Economy: Hayek, Schmitt, and Ordoliberalism’, History of European Ideas 44:1 (2018), 113-127.

 

Edited Journal Special Edition

  • ‘Morality and Political Economy’ Global Perspectives 5:4 (2024). With Patrick Doyle.

Public Engagement

2024 - Review of ‘Challengers’, The Conversation

2023 - ‘What the SVB Bailout tells us about Tech and Finance’, Labour Hub

2022 - ‘More Austerity was Always the Plan’, Tribune Magazine

2021 - ‘What the European Super League fiasco taught us about “fair competition”’ University of Essex Blog

2017 - ‘Now that Labour is close to power, we need to work out what public ownership means in our brave new progressive world’ Labour List.

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