Most economists have not yet grappled with the demands of intersectional scholarship, which recognizes the intertwined nature of gender, race, class, caste and other influences on the economic situation of individuals and groups. Among economists, feminist economists may have made the most progress and be best positioned to break further ground, though we can do better and much remains to be done. This article synthesizes the case for intersectional work, reviews the state of the economic literature, describes the contributions of the articles in this special issue of Feminist Economics on "gender, color, caste and class," and sketches directions for the future.Race, Gender, Caste, Class, Intersectionality, Feminist Economics,

The current explosion in criminalization and incarceration is unprecedented in size, scope, and negative consequences—both direct and collateral—for communities of color. These macro systems exist in relationality to the micro dynamics of living in the midst of police scrutiny, economic marginalization, and political disenfranchisement. Critical race theory is a guide for pedagogy and praxis in exploring the racist and classist foundations of current micro and macro injustices. Using Supreme Court opinions and the voices of political prisoner/prisoners of conscience as evidence of the dominant text and the dissent, this article explores the following issues: the roots of U.S. law, criminal justice, and mass imprisonment in classism and racism; the political economy of the criminal justice system and the prison industrial complex; the intersectionality of injustices rooted in micro and macro systems; and the role of prisoners of conscience/ political prisoners in inspiring resistance to micro and macro injustice.

Rather than beginning with Michael Buroway's remarks, I'd like to use an insight from Chandra Mohanty, South Asian and US feminist activist intellectual. She evokes in her latest work, Feminism Without Boundaries the following significant observation:The very practice of remembering against the grain of "public" hegemonic history, of locating the silence and the struggle to assert knowledge that is outside the parameters of the dominant, suggests a rethinking of sociality itself. (2004:83) The argument for a critical sociology, a critically engaged public sociology is so generally rendered, as proposed by Buroway that I must take Mohanty seriously -standing back and deeply interrogating his perspective. For a moment we must remember against the grain -beginning with his rendering of sociological "left history" from those "days of rage." The (Re)membering of that HistoryIt is quite true that white male left was deeply located in a Marxism of the chair. The white men (and women) had not interrogated their own positionality, its deep enmeshing in a set of white supremacist tropes and privileges: patriarchal and class entangled. These unnamed positionalities still haunt any attempt to make sociology public, and indeed, untenable Critical Sociology, Volume 31, Issue 3 also available online

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