AARON BENANAV

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

Aaron Benanav is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Global Development at Cornell University.

As a historian, sociologist, and economic and social theorist, Benanav’s research spans a variety of topics, including automation and the future of work, unemployment and underemployment, histories of social and economic development, critical theory, and alternative economic systems. 

His first book, Automation and the Future of Work, was published by Verso in 2020 and has been translated into ten languages. He recently edited a special issue of International Labor and Working-Class History on the topic of “Workers and Obsolescence.”

In addition to academic journals, Benanav's writing has appeared in publications such as The Nation, The Guardian, New Statesman, Boston Review, New Left Review, and Dissent.

Currently, Benanav is working on two new book projects. One project delves into the history and future of economic planning and democracy, while the other explores the global history of unemployment since 1940. 

In 2023-26, Benanav will serve as a core member of a University of Chicago Neubauer Collegium research team on the topic: “Economic Planning and Democratic Politics: History, Theory, and Practice.”

In 2024-25, Benanav will be a residential fellow at the New Institute in Hamburg. Benanav serves on the editorial boards of both New Left Review and International Labor and Working-Class History. 

Before he joined Cornell University, Benanav was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology at Syracuse University. Prior to that, he held a postdoctoral position at Humboldt University in Berlin and was a member of the Society of Fellows at the University of Chicago.

Benanav earned his PhD in History from the University of California, Los Angeles, and holds a BA in History from the University of Chicago.

contact: aaron.benanav@gmail.com
or twitter: @abenanav

profile on Google Scholar