The rentierization of the United Kingdom economy

Christophers, Brett

doi:10.1177/0308518x19873007

Cited by 55 publications

(61 citation statements)

References 35 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…However, this is not to say that platforms only generate income from rent. As Christophers (:6) notes, “[g]eneralizing, we can state: rent is typically part of a rentier’s income rather than its totality”. Thus, in arguing that platforms should be defined as rentiers, I mean to show that rentierism is a significant and central feature of how platforms operate and derive income.…”

Section: Extraction‐as‐a‐servicementioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

The Internet of Landlords: Digital Platforms and New Mechanisms of Rentier Capitalism

2020

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Digital platforms are a nearly ubiquitous form of intermediary and infrastructure in society. By positioning platforms in the geographical political economy/ ecology literature, this paper provides a critical analysis of platforms as a dominant form of rentier in contemporary capitalism. In doing so, I extend this work on rent theory beyond applications to land and nature so that it also includes platforms and data. I argue that the rapid rise of the "X-as-a-service" business model across nearly all sectors of the economy is creating rentier relations by another name. This model is premised on the platform latching onto and inserting itself into the production, circulation, or consumption process, thus creating opportunities to capture value. To better understand the operations and implications of platforms, I outline three key mechanisms: data extraction, digital enclosure, and capital convergence.

show abstract

Section: Extraction‐as‐a‐servicementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Whether directed at capturing data rents, ground rents, or natural resource rents (Christophers ), there are structural similarities in these different mechanisms of extraction. That is not to say these money rents and data rents are equivalent or interchangeable.…”

Section: Mechanisms Of Rentier Platformsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Internet of Landlords: Digital Platforms and New Mechanisms of Rentier Capitalism

2020

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Broadly considered to be income generated by an asset, rent is a “transfer payment” over the right to use property (Harvey and Chatterjee :32). Scholarly attention to rent in the built environment reveals fundamental changes in how property is owned and used—that is, how property becomes a financial asset for investors (Christophers ; Haila )—but rarely considers the state as the source of rents. By overlooking this fact, scholars miss a fundamental feature of financialisation: it grinds down the redistributive capacity of the state (cf.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

From the State to the Shareholder: Rent and the Production of Shareholder Value in Real Estate

Tapp

2020

Antipode

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Following the 2008 global financial crisis, the use of real estate tax credits to generate shareholder value for investors increased significantly. While tax credits are lauded as crucial to the delivery of social goods like affordable housing, the multiplier effects they supposedly generate fail to account for the hollowing out of the state that occurs as public funds are transferred to shareholders. Through a detailed case study of the historic tax credit industry in the United States, this research shows how many of the banks and financial institutions investing in tax credits have come to rely on overly engineered forms of landownership, deeply discounted credit pricing, and a wave of stock buybacks to boost their corporate profitability. This paper therefore develops a theoretical framework to understand taxation as a financialised accumulation strategy where the state serves as an important—if not problematic—source of real estate profit.

show abstract

“…As described earlier, landed wealth remains central to systems of power in Britain, across both the persistence of the aristocracy and corporations investing in land for financialisation (Shrubsole, 2019). Likewise, Brett Christophers (2019) and Beverley Skeggs (2019) argue that late capitalism has turned (back) to capitalist formations based on rent, expropriation, enclosure and exploitation to extract profit and value. Failures in land reform, described by Michael Tichelar (2018), also contribute towards understanding the resilience of the landed classes.…”

Section: The Economics Of the Firmmentioning

confidence: 99%

The corporate power of the British monarchy: Capital(ism), wealth and power in contemporary Britain

Clancy

2020

The Sociological Review

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article offers a critical analysis of the British monarchy within wider political economies of wealth and power. While sociology has renewed its interest in ‘the elites’, the British monarchy is often positioned as an archaic institution, an anachronism in relation to corporate forms of wealth and power, and therefore irrelevant. This article counters this framing by revealing the mechanics, technologies and actors ‘behind the scenes’, in order to expose and demystify the relationship between the symbolic and political-economic functions of the monarchy. To do this, I (re)conceptualise the monarchy as a corporation, ‘The Firm’, oriented towards, and historically entrenched in, processes of capital accumulation, profit extraction and other forms of exploitation. The article maps out The Firm’s labour relations, financial arrangements, inter/national relationships and networks, and the legal status of The Crown and its components in order to demonstrate how ‘old’ and ‘new’ forms of wealth intersect and converge in contemporary Britain. This article is intended as a provocation to sociological studies of elites to suggest that, in overlooking monarchy, we are overlooking a key component of contemporary capitalism, and a key component in the reproduction of inequalities today.

show abstract

The rentierization of the United Kingdom economy

Cited by 55 publications

References 35 publications

The Internet of Landlords: Digital Platforms and New Mechanisms of Rentier Capitalism

The Internet of Landlords: Digital Platforms and New Mechanisms of Rentier Capitalism

From the State to the Shareholder: Rent and the Production of Shareholder Value in Real Estate

The corporate power of the British monarchy: Capital(ism), wealth and power in contemporary Britain

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About