A New Agenda for the Social Sciences

What a marvelous and ambitious book this is. I share all the reasons for
praising it: its breadth, its ambition, its grasp of history, and its
use of hard-earned statistical series. And I love the way Piketty relies
on various novels to paint the picture of class and economic strategies
in periods long gone. I also share many of the criticisms, particularly
by my brethren in political science, political theory, and political
sociology: its failure to comprehend the complexity of power, politics
or institutions.

Let me first vent one minor irritant. Novels play an important purpose
in this book by giving us a flavor of societies, their norms about
property and inheritance, and the influence those norms have on the way
people construct their lives. We learn of the novels of Austin and
Balzac, but what of the writers addressing the reactions of people to
the economies of the twentieth, let alone twenty-first century?
Dystopian novels abound, capturing the fears of technology and of
environmental disaster, but there are also those that reveal the lives
of those affected by Wall Street, the decline of the family farm, the
transformation of industry and work. We get a somewhat nuanced sense of
the life of the striver and struggler of the nineteenth century but
little sense of those who inhabit the current century—or even the last.

Now to the main points. Others, particularly some of those contributing
to the *Crooked Timber* collection already offer telling
critiques of the weaknesses in Piketty’s political analysis. I do not
want to rehearse well-tread ground but focus instead on issues where I
think Piketty requires the help of other kinds of social scientists to
enhance his important agenda. In particular, I will discuss two
work-related issues: technology and the changing nature of jobs. Then I
shall turn to more standard political questions: the roles of the state,
organized interests, and beliefs.

Piketty provides the crucial building blocks with his documentation of
inequality and his arguments about why it is the natural outgrowth of
the kinds of economies we have built. The grand (some would say
grandiose) title of his opus—but even more importantly the work
itself—makes him a worthy successor of the great political economists he
echoes: Adam Smith and Karl Marx. But for Piketty neither the invisible
hand nor class conflict will lead to a reduction in inequality. In the
spirit of John Maynard Keynes, his panacea is fiscal. However, the point
of the taxes Piketty advocates is not to resuscitate an economy in
depression but rather to inhibit the continued growth of inequality in
income and wealth with all its disastrous consequences for human welfare
as well as the economy.

As erudite and thoughtful as Piketty is and despite the length and
detailed scholarship represented in *Capital in the Twenty-First
Century*, no single author—even one calling on collaborators in his
field as good as Anthony Atkinson, Gilles Postel-Vinay, Jean-Laurent
Rosenthal, and Emmanual Saez—can be expert on everything. To make his
case even stronger, let alone take the next step in realizing effective
change, Piketty needs the support of those better schooled in political
science, political sociology, political philosophy, political history,
and political psychology, disciplines to which he tips his hat but on
which he barely relies.

### The changing nature of the workplace

While Piketty focuses on the macro changes in inequality overall, he
neglects how work relationships are changing in ways that also produce
inequity and inequality. One of the recent projects of CASBS (the Center
for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences), which I direct, is on
the Future of Work and Workers. We have an [on-going
series](http://www.psmag.com/work) in *Pacific Standard* documenting the
transformations in jobs caused by new technologies and new kinds of
work. Despite the disagreements revealed in the essays by scholars,
technologists, labor activists, business leaders, politicians, and
policy analysts about what the world of work will look like in twenty
years or so, a few clear outlines emerge. Whether robots eradicate human
effort or assist it, advanced industrial economies are likely to have
fewer and fewer high-end jobs, more and more service jobs, and a
significant decrease in full-time occupations with benefits. In the
developing world—indeed in the entire world—various forms of bonded
labor and servitude are re-emerging. Where workers lack locations to
congregate regularly—be it around water coolers, at dispatch halls, or
in factories—collective action will need to evolve to ensure the kind of
worker voice and pressure to which governments and politicians respond
and that serve to promote the kinds of protections and tax systems
Piketty advocates.

### A theory of the state and government

Government becomes a major player in Piketty’s *Capital*. It is
government that imposes taxes and provides social security, key
components of an equalizing program. His statistical analysis documents
the growth since 1870 of what he labels “the social state” (p. 474 and
passim), one that plays a “central role in economic and social life,”
not just war and security. But this is a description not an analysis of
the role of government; we gain but hints of possible reasons for the
expansions and contractions in its interventions in social and economic
life. What we need is an argument about the relationship between civil
society and state. We know that high inequality in wealth translates
somewhat directly—but not perfectly—into high inequality in power.
Piketty is certainly not making the claim of Marx and Engels in *The
Communist Manifesto* that, “The executive of the modern state is but a
committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie” Yet,
how the wealthy operate and under what circumstances the non-wealthy
have voice and influence must be part of an account that offers
reasonable prescriptions for creating greater equality. This is a domain
in which recent research on American politics and political history
excels. See, for example: [Larry Bartels](http://amzn.to/20K8lqW),
[Martin Gilens](http://amzn.to/1GVcaTH), [Louis](http://amzn.to/1liU2cv)
[Hyman](http://amzn.to/1GVcu4P), [Elisabeth Clemens and Doug
Guthrie](http://amzn.to/20K9BdI), [Jacob Hacker and Paul
Pierson](http://amzn.to/1liUrvJ), [Ira
Katznelson](http://amzn.to/1GVcWju) and [Monica
Prasad](http://amzn.to/1liUNlZ).

Ultimately, what we need is an appropriate theory of the modern state,
its forms of government, and the role of democratic institutions where
they exist. It is not incumbent upon Piketty to offer this kind of
theory, but his agenda raises a call for those of us who can to step in
and step up. And many have. To name but a few who have taken on the
grand task of helping to develop better theories of the state and of
government: [Francis Fukuyama](http://amzn.to/20Ka6UY), [Peter
Evans](http://amzn.to/1liVBan), [Robert Bates](http://amzn.to/20KaVx5),
[Bo Rothstein](http://amzn.to/1GVeha0), and [Barry
Weingast](http://www.jstor.org/stable/2952354?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents).

### Organized interests

To advance a program of reducing inequality and inequity in modern
capitalist societies and of improving the quality of life and work
depends on a fuller understanding of the actors in civil society.
Piketty’s emphasis is on governmental and economic actors to the extent
there is an emphasis on actors at all. Actually, his book is more of a
structural account than one in which we have a good sense of the key
actors and their strategic possibilities. So, the first move in
producing a better political analysis is to identify the players, their
potential coalitions, and their range of actions under different
conditions. This means going beyond the wealthy and the government to
specify the key sets of players within those groupings as well as
outside them. The second move is to bring in civil society more fully.
[Boix](http://amzn.to/20Kc1sG), [Acemoglu and
Robinson](http://amzn.to/1GVfazk), and [North, Wallis, and
Weingast](http://amzn.to/1liX2Wt) attempted to do that in their accounts
of the rise of democracy, but the Piketty problem is a different one,
more similar to that of [Piven and Cloward](http://amzn.to/20KcoU9) in
understanding American welfare programs. Who are the organized interests
who can engage in effective political influence and when can they do so?
What role do voters play? Labor unions were mentioned but once or twice
in passing in Piketty’s book and political parties hardly at all; voting
received a brief notice. Yet, the literature in political science and
political sociology on these subjects is huge and instructive. Of
special interest to Piketty should be the numerous works on relatively
contemporary tax policy in developed economies (e.g.,
[Steinmo](http://www.jstor.org/stable/2010528);
[Daunton](http://amzn.to/1Mmj41a); [Lieberman](http://amzn.to/1Mmj8hs);
[Mares](http://amzn.to/20Kd3ov); [Bergman](http://amzn.to/20Kdb7w);
[Martin et al.](http://amzn.to/1Mmjh4p);
[Delalande](http://amzn.to/20KdnUd); [Martin](http://amzn.to/1GVgRwN)).

### Beliefs

The third building block is also crucial. Culture and ideology both
contribute to the roles government can play in an economy and to the
ways members of society change their demands and outlook. This Piketty
recognizes. But underlying culture and ideology are beliefs what the
world is like and what any individual or set of people can do about that
world. Although Piketty acknowledges that the current state of affairs
has attained a legitimacy that he is challenging with his work, the
mechanisms of legitimizing demand greater attention. We know, for
example, that effective tax collection depends on confidence that the
government is able to ensure that, first, taxes go to the promised
expenditures (without too much corruption en route or distortion at the
end) and, second, others pay their taxes. But the belief in the fairness
and the reliability in the tax system these conditions imply only occur
where there is a bureaucracy capable of identifying who can pay what and
able to enforce the rules. Only then do we get what I’ve [elsewhere
called](http://amzn.to/20KdMWK) “quasi-voluntary compliance”: coercion
is a backdrop, yes, but people will willingly contribute because they
believe in the purposes of taxes.

But what makes citizens believe or honor the ends taxes are meant to
serve? The non-economic literature
([Hochschild](http://amzn.to/1GVheaJ);
[Ferejohn](http://amzn.to/20Kel33); [Scholz and
Pinney](http://www.jstor.org/stable/2111622); [Levi and
Sacks](http://ck8gh5qu6z.scholar.serialssolutions.com/?sid=google&auinit=M&aulast=Levi&atitle=Legitimating+beliefs:+concepts+and+measures&title=Regulation+%26+governance&volume=3&date=2009&spage=311&issn=1748-5983);
[Levi et al.](http://abs.sagepub.com/content/53/3/354.full.pdf);
[Dickson[(http://www.nyu.edu/gsas/dept/politics/faculty/dickson/dickson_leadership.pdf) complements that from the economists. As John Ahlquist and I
argued in a [recent book](http://amzn.to/1liZ7Sb), such beliefs are an
effect of the rules and processes embodied in organizations,
governments, and groups. When individuals believe that they are being
treated fairly, when they are given credible information about the way
the world works, and when their socialization and opportunities enable
them act on ethical commitments, they are more likely to develop an
“expanded community of fate,” in which they see their fates entwined
with others—often strangers—in a larger society. They are then more
likely to make sacrifices in taxes and to overcome a narrow view of
self-interest in service of a larger societal good.

To claim that Piketty has failed to provide a sufficient political
analysis in *Capital in the Twenty-First Century* is not really a
criticism of his extraordinary book and its ambitious agenda. Rather it
is a call to the rest of the social science community to provide that
additional arguments and evidence needed if we are to succeed in making
our economies and polities more equitable and better adapted to serving
the human needs of their entire populations.