Imagined Futures : : Fictional Expectations and Capitalist Dynamics / / Jens Beckert.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Harvard University Press Complete eBook-Package 2016
• VerfasserIn: Beckert, Jens,
• Place / Publishing House: Cambridge, MA : : Harvard University Press, , [2016]; ©2016
• Year of Publication: 2016
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (358 p.) :; 2 charts, 12 graphs

Consumers, investors, and corporations orient their activities toward a future that contains opportunities and risks. How do these actors assess uncertainty? Jens Beckert adds a new chapter to the theory of capitalism by showing how fictional expectations drive modern economies—or throw them into crisis when imagined futures fail to materialize.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- 1. Introduction -- I. Decision- Making in an Uncertain World -- 2. The Temporal Order of Capitalism -- 3. Expectations and Uncertainty -- 4. Fictional Expectations -- II. Building Blocks of Capitalism -- 5. Money and Credit: The Promise of Future Value -- 6. Investments: Imaginaries of Profit -- 7. Innovation: Imaginaries of Technological Futures -- 8. Consumption: Value from Meaning -- III. Instruments of Imagination -- 9. Forecasting: Creating the Present -- 10. Economic Theory: The Crystal Ball of Calculative Devices -- 11. Conclusion: The Enchanted World of Capitalism -- Notes -- References -- Index