Could spending be virtuous and thrift bad? Left-wing economic and cultural historian James Livingston thinks so. He suggests -- taking on the 19th century Populists, the Frankfurt School, and current economic orthodoxy along the way -- that consumption is good for social justice and the environment. Livingston argues that, in place of austerity and frugality, investment should be socialized, wages increased, and the workweek shortened.

What drives capitalism and why does it break down? Celebrated Marxist geographer David Harvey argues the answer lies with the lifeblood of the system, capital. He examines how capital encounters barriers -- such as labor and nature -- which it is driven to overcome by busting unions, forcing down wages, and fostering urbanization, and through technological and organizational innovations. Harvey talks about how the transcendence of certain barriers to high rates of growth can lead to the creation of new ones.

There is a great deal of debate within the Marxist left about whether the economic crisis is the result of the long-term ill health of the so-called "real economy" or if the system crashed out of its inherent volatility. Noted historian Robert Brenner argues that it has roots in an extended period of stagnation, which he elucidated in a talk at the Berkeley Sociology Colloquium titled "Prosperity and Crisis in the World Economy: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow."