Framing finance : the boundaries of markets and modern capitalism / Alex Preda.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Preda, Alex, 1960-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Finance--Social aspects.

Finance.

Stock exchanges--Social aspects.

Stock exchanges.

Capitalism--Social aspects.

Capitalism.

Social aspects.

Physical Description:

viii, 318 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm

Place of Publication:

Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 2009.

Summary:

Framing Finance examines the history of the market to figure out how we arrived at a point where investing is not only commonplace, but critical. As Alex 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.

Contents:

Introduction: capitalism and the boundaries of finance

The boundaries of finance in the sociological tradition

Prestige, at last: the social closure of the stock exchange

Financial knowledge and the science of the market

Close up: price data, machines, and organizational boundaries

From afar: charts and their analysts

The kaleidoscope of finance: speculation, economic life, and society

On the dark side of the market

Panic!

Conclusion: back to the future.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [281]-306) and index.

ISBN:

9780226679310

9780226679327

0226679314

0226679322

OCLC:

262429580