Photo credit: Mustafah Abdulaziz / New Statesman

Curriculum Vitae

Aaron Benanav


pdf  for download

EMPLOYMENT

Cornell University, 2024-
Assistant Professor, Department of Global Development
College of Agriculture and Life Sciences

Syracuse University, 2022-2024
Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology
Core Faculty, Autonomous Systems Policy Institute
Affiliate Faculty, Department of History
Maxwell School of Citizenship & Public Affairs

Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, 2020-2022
Post-Doctoral Researcher
Academic Coordinator of the Research Unit “Re-Allocation”
for the Excellenzcluster SCRIPTS: Contestations of the Liberal Script

University of Chicago, 2016-2020
Harper-Scmidt Fellow in the Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts
Collegiate Assistant Professor, Social Sciences
Affiliate Faculty, Department of History

EDUCATION

PUBLICATIONS

Book Projects

Journal Articles

Special Issue Editor

  • “Workers and Obsolescence” (co-edited with Lori Flores, with a co-written introduction to the issue), International Labor and Working Class History, 102, Fall 2022.

Edited Volumes

  • “Crisis and Immiseration: Critical Theory Today” (with John Clegg), in The SAGE Handbook of Frankfurt School Critical Theory, eds. Werner Bonefeld, et. al., New York, Sage Publications, 2018, pp. 1629-48.

  • “Misery and Debt: On the Logic and History of Surplus Populations and Surplus Capital” (with John Clegg), in Contemporary Marxist Theory: A Reader, eds. Andrew Pendakis, et. al., New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2014, pp. 585-608.

Other Print Publications

Online Publications

Interviews

Editor

HONORS AND AWARDS

  • 2024-25 Residential Fellowship, New Institute

  • 2023-26 UChicago Neubauer Three-Year Grant Award, “Economic Planning and Democratic Politics: History, Theory, and Practice”

  • 2021 SCRIPTS Grant, “A Global History of Unemployment”

  • 2021 SCRIPTS Grant, “The Essential Worker”

  • 2017 University of Chicago Feminist Forum Professor Award

  • 2016-20 University of Chicago Society of Fellows Harper-Schmidt Fellowship

  • 2013-14 UCLA Graduate Division Dissertation Year Fellowship

  • 2012-13 UCLA History Department Pre-Dissertation Year Fellowship

  • 2008 History Department Comprehensive Exams passed “with distinction”

  • 2007 & 2008 UCLA Graduate Division Graduate Summer Research Mentorship

INVITED TALKS

  • “Redefining Development: Navigating Informality, Automation, and Ethical Choice in Technology in the Global Economy,” Department of Global Development, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Cornell University, 3/15/24.

  • “La Automatización y el Futuro del Trabajo,” Curso: La Fantasía de la Automatización, Nociones Comunes, Madrid, Spain, 3/7/24.

  • “Relative Surplus Population in Contemporary Capitalism,” State University of Campinas (UNICAMP), Sao Paolo, Brazil, 11/8/23.

  • “Will ChatGPT Eliminate More Jobs than It Creates? How Would We Know?” Emerging  Technologies and the Future of Work Conference, Institute for Ethics and Emerging  Technologies, University of Massachusetts Boston, 11/4/23.

  • “The Community Ideal and the Multi-Criterial Economy in the History of Political Thought,” Political Economy Department, University of Sydney, 10/24/23.

  • “The Community Ideal and the Multi-Criterial Economy in the History of Political Thought,” Fisher Center for the Study of Gender and Justice, Hobart and William Smith  Colleges, 9/20/23.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work” (book talk), Economics Department, Rikkyo University, Tokyo, Japan, 6/17/23.

  • “Imagining New Subjectivities: Automation and the Future of Work” Philosophy Department, University of Tokyo, Komaba Campus, 6/10/23.

  • “Automation – Digital Anthropology” (invited panelist), Groupe d’Études Géopolitiques, UNESCO Management of Social Transformations Programme, École Normale Supérieure, Paris, 5/25/23.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work: Expectations vs. Reality,” Computational Social Science Seminar, MIT Institute for Data, Systems, and Society and Media Lab, 5/3/23.

  • “Post-Scarcity Economics: An Introduction,” Political Economy Research Center, Goldsmiths University of London, 3/23/23.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work,” Indiana University Informatics Colloquium,
    Luddy School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering, IU Bloomington, 12/2/22

  • “Automation and the Future of Work in the post-Covid Era” (keynote), Korean Critical
    Sociological Association Annual Conference, Seoul, South Korea, 11/5/22.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work,” Korean Labor Institute, Seoul, South Korea, 11/4/22.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work,” Department of Sociology, Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea, 11/3/22.

  • “Markets, Planning, and the Politics of Human Need” (keynote), Marx22 Conference: Primitive Accumulation, Stockholm, Sweden, 10/29/22.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work,” School of Information Studies, Syracuse University, 10/28/22.

  • “Introducing Post-Scarcity Economics,” The Algorithmic Road to Socialism? A Workshop on Digital Technologies and Postcapitalist Imaginaries, English Department, Christian-Albrechts-Universität, Kiel, Germany, 6/3/22.

  • “New Directions in the Study of Work” (invited panelist), Department of Sociology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada, 4/8/22.

  • “El futuro del trabajo: nuevas tecnologías, informalidad y reproducción social” (invited panelist), ¿Hacia dónde va el trabajo? Informalidad, digitalización y reproducción social en América Latina, Facultad de Ciencias Sociales de la Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina, 4/7/22.

  • “Theory in Crisis Seminar – Post-scarcity economics: the Foundations of Life after Capitalism,” University of London Institute in Paris, France, 2/18/22.

  • “Automation, the End of Work, and a New Tomorrow?” Critical Studies Programme, Sandberg Instituut, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 1/13-14/22.

  • “Automation and the End of Work?” Bern University of the Arts, 12/1/21.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work in the Global Economy,” Past Futures of Work (I) Conference, Working Futures, Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, 10/29/21.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work in the Pandemic Economy,” People, Organisations and Work Institute, De Montfort University (UK), 10/20/21.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work” (keynote), The Digitalization of the World of Work Conference, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (Germany), 10/13/21.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work in the Pandemic Economy,” Centre for Digital Cultures, Leuphana University (Germany), 6/8/21.

  • “Automation and the End of Work?” Digital Futures at Work Research Centre, Sussex University (UK), 5/19/21.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work,” Digitalization and Automation in Contemporary Capitalism Series, a joint project of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, Federal University of Ceará, and the Unisinos University (Brazil), 4/30/21.

  • “Post-scarcity economics,” Kolloquium Technologie, Gesellschaft, politische Ökonomie, Humboldt University of Berlin (Germany), 4/28/21.

  • “Cambio tecnológico y derecho: automatización del trabajo e inteligencia artificial,” Law and Society Seminar, Colegio de Mexico, 4/21/21.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work,” Rhodes Center, Brown University, 3/26/21.

  • “Automation and the end of work? Labor market dynamics between innovation and Stagnation,” Department of Sociology, Syracuse University, 2/26/21.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work,” Critical Theory Center, Humboldt University of Berlin (Germany), 1/20/21.

  • “COVID-19 and Workplace Automation,” Globalization, Work and Production Research Group, Berlin Social Sciences Center (Germany), 1/13/21.

  • “The History of Automation and the Future of Work,” Department of Sociology, University of California, Berkeley, 9/28/2020.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work in the Global Pandemic Economy,” Fall Colloquium Series, University of Texas at Austin, 9/21/2020.

  • “Labor faces the Automation Question,” Political Science Colloquium, University of Delaware, 2/28/2020.

  • “The End of Unemployment? Economic Indicators and the Search for Social Stability” Business, Government, and International Economy Unit, Harvard Business School, 1/30/2020.

  • “The Global History of Unemployment: Adventures of an Economic Concept,” Center for Liberal Arts, Webster Vienna Private University, 3/25/19.

  • “A Critical History of Unemployment: From Marx to Modern Times,” Hispanic and Portuguese Studies Department, University of Pennsylvania, 11/17/17.

  • “A Global History of Unemployment: The Historical Adventures of an Economic Concept,” Critical Social Theory at McGill, McGill University, 11/6/17.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work,” Radical Futures Series, International Institute for Research and Education in Amsterdam, NL, 9/7/17.

  • “Demography and Dispossession: Explaining the Growth of the Global Informal Proletariat,” International Institute for Social History in Amsterdam, NL, 9/5/17.

  • “The End of Unemployment? The ILO Confronts the Global Jobs Deficit, 1945-1995,” Grass Humanities Institute, Johns Hopkins University, 4/26/17.

  • “Too Many People or Too Few Jobs: A Critique of Political Demography after 1950,” The Institute for Humanities Research, UC Santa Cruz, 2/17/2016.

  • “A World without Work: The Global Jobs Crisis in Historical Perspective,” Global Studies Department, UC Santa Barbara, 1/19/16.

SELECTED PRESENTATIONS

  • “Automation, the end of work, and a new tomorrow?” SUPA Sociology, Syracuse University, 5/23/24.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work,” Fabric Yphanet, Thessaloniki, Greece, 5/10/24.

  • “What Do You Call an Accountant Who Drives a Taxi?” The History of Economics in the Expanded Field, HOPE Conference, Duke University, 4/27/24.

  • “Against the Clock: Aaron Benanav in conversation with Lain Iwakura and Jeronimo
    Voss” (talk at an art exhibit), Basel, Switzerland, 4/12/24.

  • “Work, Workers, and the Future of Technology,” The Climate of Critical Theory: Economies and Ecologies Today, Humanities Center, University of Rochester, 3/29/24.

  • “Workers and Obsolescence: Histories of Technology, Labor, and Workplace Struggle” (panel chair), American Historical Association Annual Meeting, San Francisco, 1/6/24.

  • “Gender and Sexuality in Law and Social Policy” (commentator), History and Political Economy Project Conference, University of Pennsylvania, 12/16/23.

  • “Future of Work Panel,” AI Policy Symposium, Syracuse Autonomous Systems Policy 
    Institute (ASPI), Washington, DC, 10/27/23.

  • “Business Ethics, Automation, and the Future of Work,” Ethos Festival, Rome, 10/7/23.

  • “Automation, Algorithms, and the Future of Work” (invited roundtable), American
    Sociological Association Annual Conference, Philadelphia, PA, 8/21/23.

  • “100 Years Later: The Frankfurt School and the Now” (opening plenary), Brooklyn Institute for Social Research, 7/14/23.

  • “Guild Socialism and the Polycentric Society in the History of Utopian Thought,” Council of European Studies Conference, Reykjavik, Iceland, 6/28/23

  • “Automation and the Future of Work” (book talk), Maruzen Junkudo Umeda Bookstore, Osaka, Japan, 6/17/23.

  • “Technological Unemployment: Myth or Truth” (with Daniel Susskind) Festival Economia, Trento, Italy, 5/28/23.

  • “The Frontiers of Artificial Intelligence: Automation and the Future of Work,” Festival Economia, Trento, Italy, 5/28/23.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work” (book talk), Salone del libro, Turin, 5/15/23.

  • “Technology and Popular Power” (panel discussant), Law and Political Economy
    Conference, Harvard Law School, 3/31/23.

  • “The Meddlers: Jamie Martin in conversation with Aaron Benanav and Adom Getachew,” Phenomenal World, 11/21/22.

  • “Sta finendo il lavoro così come lo abbiamo conosciuto? Aaron Benanav
    in conversation with Greta Sclaunich,” Milano Digital Week, Milan, Italy, 11/13/22.

  • “Automazione e futuro del lavoro: Aaron Benanav in conversation with Antonio Casilli,” Biennale Tecnologia, Turin, Italy, 11/12/22.

  • “Strategic Responses to Digital Transformation” (panel discussion), Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, Seoul, South Korea, 11/4/22.

  • “Political Economy of Digital Technology” (panel discussion), Inspiration Forum, Prague, Czechia, 10/27/22.

  • “Automation and the End of Work?” Digital Discourses: Science/Fiction, Goethe-Institut Indonesien, Center for Digital Society, Jakarta, Indonesia, 10/27/22.

  • “Socialist Investment, Dynamic Planning, and the Politics of Human Need,” Socialism: Rationality and Distribution Workshop, Freie Universität Berlin, 7/1/22.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work,” Culturitical, Hansa48 Social Center, 6/2/22.

  • “Socialist Investment, Dynamic Planning, and the Politics of Human Need,” Socialism Futures, European University Institute, Florence, Italy, 5/26/22.

  • “Roundtable: Keynes and Keynesianism Reconsidered,” University of Chicago Paris Center, France, 5/7/22.

  • “Unemployment, Automation, and Post-Scarcity Economics,” Work, Economy and Social Policy Club, Hertie School, Berlin, 2/10/22.

  • “Covid-19 and Its Afterlives: The Future of Work,” with Aaron Benanav and Grace Blakely, NYU Skirball Center in collaboration with N+1 and Verso, 1/13/22.

  • “Automatisierung und die Zukunft der Arbeit,” Die Vierte Sache, Volksbühne Roter Salon, with the support of the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, Berlin, 12/17/21.

  • “Geht Uns die Arbeit Aus?” Kosmopolitics hosted by Wochenzeitung, Zürich, 11/29/21.

  • “Futuring the Liberal Script #4: Automation and the Future of Work,” SCRIPTS Berlin, 10/18/21.

  • “Automation, the End of Work, and a New Tomorrow?” Unsound Festival 2021: Deep Authentic (Poland), 10/15/21. 

  • “Automation, the End of Work, and a New Tomorrow?” (keynote), Terrestrial Forum: Horizons of Change, Ministry of Space (Serbia), 8/26/21.

  • “Post-Scarcity Economics,” Transmediale Summer Camp: For Refusal, 7/7/21.

  • “Beyond the Future of Work” (keynote panel), Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Justice, University of Texas at Austin, 5/24/21.

  • “Reimagining Futures of Work” (keynote panel), sponsored by Nordic Talks, Hanken School of Economics, Helsinki, 4/28/21.

  • “Technology, Automation, and Socialist Strategy” (panel discussion), Online Speaker Series, Science & Society, 4/3/21.

  • “The Pandemic Economy & the Future of Work,” Covid Capitalism Series, School of
    Labor and Urban Studies, City University of New York, 11/19/20.

  • “A discussion about Automation and the Future of Work, with Katrina Forrester and Tim Barker, N+1, 10/15/20.

  • “Welfare, Labor, Re-Allocation,” SCRIPTS: Contestations of the Liberal Script, Opening Conference, Freie Universität, Berlin, Germany, 2/8/20.

  • “The Green New Deal and the Future of Work in America,” Center for Work and Democracy, Arizona State University, 11/1/19.

  • “Abundance is a Social Relation,” Speculative Design: Post-Petroleum Utopias, 3CT, University of Chicago, 5/31/19.

  • “In What Sense is the End of Work a New Beginning?”, Capitalism and Social Theory: A Conference in Memory of Moishe Postone, University of Chicago, 4/12/19.

  • “The History of Automation and the Future of Work,” 
History of Capitalism Workshop, University of Chicago, 11/15/18.

  • “Production and Profit in an Overcrowded World Economy,” Social Science History Conference, 11/10/19.

  • “The Logic of Gender: Social Reproduction in the Global Economy,”
Tong Saam Social Center, Hong Kong, HK, 10/26/18.

  • “The Construction of a Globally Operational Concept of Unemployment at the UN,” International History Workshop, Columbia University, 9/26/19.

  • “Automation and the Future of Work,” Society of Fellows Workshop, University of Chicago, 6/1/18.

  • “Demography and Dispossession: Explaining the Growth of the Global Informal Proletariat,” Social Science History Conference, 11/4/17.

  • “Unemployment on the World-Scale,” History of Capitalism Workshop, University of Chicago, 10/10/17.

  • “The ILO and the End of Unemployment,” Society of Fellows Workshop, The University of Chicago, 4/17/17.

  • “Demography and Dispossession,” Social Theory Workshop, The University of Chicago, 11/10/16.

  • “Dimensions of the Present Crisis” (opening plenary), Second Annual Historical Materialism Conference, New York, NY, 1/14/16.

  • “Deindustrialization in a Global Perspective,” Seventh Annual Historical Materialism Conference, New York, NY, 4/25/2015.

  • “The New Global Revolutions,” The Center for Social Theory & Comparative History, UCLA, 4/15/13.

TEACHING EXPERIENCE

Assistant Professor, Sociology Department, Syracuse University, 2022-

  • Economy and Society (Fall 2023), graduate seminar, instructor of record.

  • Automation and the Future of Work (Spring 2023), instructor of record.

  • Sociological Theory (Fall 2022, Spring 2023), instructor of record.

Collegiate Asst. Professor, Social Sciences, University of Chicago, 2016-2020

  • A Global History of Unemployment (Spring 2018), instructor of record.

  • Power, Identity, Resistance (Fall, Winter, Spring, 2016-2020), instructor of record.

Lecturer, History Department, University of California, Los Angeles, 2016

  • World History since 1760 (Spring 2016), instructor of record.

University of California, Santa Cruz, 2011-2015
Lecturer, College Nine

  • International and Global Issues (Fall 2011-2015), instructor of record.

University of California, Los Angeles, 2008-2009
Teaching Fellow, History Department

  • A Science of the Subject? Psychoanalysis and Social Theory (Spring 2009), instructor of record.

  • History of Modern Thought (Fall 2008 & Winter 2009), teaching assistant.

University of California, Los Angeles, 2007-2008
Teaching Assistant, History Department

  • Social Knowledge and Social Power (Winter 2008).

  • Introduction to Western Civilization, Ancient Civilizations to A.D. 843 (Fall 2007).

University of California, Los Angeles, 2007-2008
Teaching Assistant, German Department

  • Figures who Changed the World (Winter 2007 & Spring 2008).

PROFESSIONAL SERVICE

  • Project Organizer, “Economic Planning and Democratic Politics,” Year-Long Talk Series on Economic Planning and End of Year Capstone Conference on “The Green Transition, Planning, and Democracy,” Neubauer Collegium, University of Chicago, 2023-24

  • Executive Committee, Department of Sociology, Syracuse University, 2023-24

  • Academic Coordinator, Research Unit “(Re)-Allocation, Excellenzcluster “SCRIPTS: Contestations of the Liberal Script,” Humboldt Universität, 2020-22

  • Resident Head, Stony Island House, The University of Chicago, 2019-2020

  • Co-Chair, Society of Fellows, The University of Chicago, 2017-18

  • Faculty Advisor, Social Theory Workshop, The University of Chicago, 2017-18

  • Administrator, UCLA Center for Social Theory and History, 2015-2016

  • Member, Committee to Revise Core Curriculum, UCSC, College Nine, 2015

PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS

  • American Sociological Association

  • Social Science History Association

  • American Historical Association

  • History and Political Economy Project Advisory Board

  • Working Futures Research Network (Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin)

THESES SUPERVISED

  • Katherine Mott, Sociology Department, Syracuse University, “Everyday They Get Our Best: Exploring Cultures of Solidarity and Resignation in Retail Grocery Work,” PhD Dissertation Committee Member.

  • Benjamin Ferschli, Sociology Department, Oxford University, “Capitalism without Workers: The Political Economy of Automation, Work and Structural Change in the Central and Eastern European Automotive Industry between 2010 and 2019,” PhD Examiner.

  • Lukas Müller-Wünsch, Political Science Department, Freie Universität, “The Economic Calculation Problem in the Age of Climate Crisis,” MA Thesis Advisor, 2022.

  • Christian Montagu, Freie Universität, “On the Political Prospects of UBI - A Sociological Approach,” MA Thesis Advisor

  • Patrick Madden, UC Santa Cruz, “The Concept of Population in Anglo-Scottish Political Economic Thought: Origins, Ideology, and Critique,” PhD Thesis Committee Member

  • Keaton Boyle, UChicago MAPSS Program, “Selling Privacy: Competing Digital Privacy Concepts in Big Tech,” MA Thesis Advisor

LANGUAGES

  • Spanish (reading)

  • French (reading)

  • German (reading)