As the banking crisis and its effects on the world economy have made plain, the stock market is of colossal importance to our livelihoods. In "Framing Finance", Alex Preda looks at the history of the market to figure out how we arrived at a point where investing is not only commonplace, but critical, as market fluctuations threaten our plans to send our children to college or retire comfortably. As Preda discovers through extensive research, the public was once much more skeptical. For investing to become accepted, a deep-seated prejudice against speculation had to be overcome, and Preda reveals that over the course of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries groups associated with stock exchanges in New York, London, and Paris managed to redefine finance as a scientific pursuit grounded in observational technology. But Preda also notes that as the financial data in which they trafficked became ever more difficult to understand, charismatic speculators emerged whose manipulations of the market undermined the benefits of widespread investment. And so, "Framing Finance" ends with an eye on the future, proposing a system of public financial education to counter the irrational elements that still animate the appeal of finance.

About the Author
Alex Preda is a reader in sociology at the University of Edinburgh, the author of AIDS, Rhetoric, and Medical Knowledge, and coeditor of The Sociology of Financial Markets.

Reviews
"Framing Finance looks at the history of finance from a completely new perspective, combining sociology, history, economics, and literary and cultural studies. Drawing on his original historical data, Preda proposes several innovative theoretical ideas and concepts that may well become household notions in writings on finance." - Karen Knorr Cetina, University of Chicago"



Book Information
ISBN 9780226679327
Author Alex Preda
Format Paperback
Page Count 328
Imprint University of Chicago Press
Publisher The University of Chicago Press
Weight(grams) 482g
Dimensions(mm) 23mm * 15mm * 2mm