In this episode one of my past co-hosts Giulia Luvisotto takes the lead and discusses the book Money: The Currency of Politics with its author Stefan Eich, Assistant Professor of Government at Georgetown University. Eich draws attention on what he takes to be an important yet unduly neglected truth: far from being a neutral means of exchange, money is intrinsically political. To make his case, Eich retraces the genealogy of this thesis (and of its neglect) by looking at the authors that play a key role in it: Aristotle, Locke, Fichte, Marx and Keynes and tells a gripping story of how our conception of money changed because of contextual historical factors.

Giulia and Stefan discuss these thinkers in sequence to bring forth how each contributes to the neglect of the political status of money, trying to highlight their peculiarities and clarify their ambiguities. But ultimately the goal is to get to the core of the matter: in what sense is money itself political? Why has this truth been concealed? What sort of politics do we want to strive for? Are there viable alternatives to the status quo?

If successful, this episode would not leave you with a number of learnt lessons but with a heightened sense that more attention on money is needed and a thirst for further reflection on the matter.