Dr Alex Sutton
Senior Lecturer in Political Economy
School of Law and Social Sciences
Role
I joined the Department in September 2018. I have worked at a number of institutions throughout the UK, having received my PhD from the University of Warwick. My research is interdisciplinary, situated in both radical political economy and British history. My main research interest is in understanding the role of imperialism in British policy-making.
Teaching and supervision
Modules taught
Undergraduate
- U23220 The Global Political Economy
- U23126 Modern British Politics.
Postgraduate
- P23102 Global Political Economy
- P23108 Production, Finance and Global Governance
- P23151 Global Political Economy (DL).
Publications
Journal articles
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Sutton A, 'Primitive Accumulation in the East Africa Groundnut Scheme'
Diplomacy and Statecraft 35 (2) (2024) pp.338-362
ISSN: 0959-2296 eISSN: 1557-301XAbstractPublished here Open Access on RADARThis paper revisits the Groundnut Scheme, a postwar colonial development project in East Africa infamous for its catastrophic failure. It examines the plans made by British state managers and the Scheme’s planners at both the United Africa Company and the Overseas Food Corporation to transform African colonial subjects into stabilized wage-labourers. The paper seeks to understand this social transformation in the context of the contradictory nature of capitalist social relations. This is achieved by using Marx’s concept of primitive accumulation: the separation of the worker from their means of subsistence. The paper focuses on two aspects of this process. Firstly, the creation of remote villages for the Scheme’s workers, physically separating them from traditional support structures. Secondly, the creation of a new gendered division of labour that would have transformed the homelife of the Scheme’s workers.
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Sutton A, 'Generalised Comedy Production: British Political Economy and Stand-Up'
Global Society 35 (1) (2020) pp.117-133
ISSN: 1360-0826 eISSN: 1469-798XAbstractPublished here Open Access on RADARBuilding on recent work on the political and everyday nature of comedy, this paper seeks to situate the
genre of stand-up comedy as a form of capitalist social relations. The paper focuses on the emergence
of Alternative Comedy in the 1980s in contrast to the comedy of Working Men’s Clubs. This cultural
development is placed in the context of Marx’s understanding of capitalist society and a critique of
Adorno’s notion of the culture industry. The paper argues that this radical change in British comedy
was only made possible by the policies of the British state in the 1980s. In particular, the paper
considers the changing ideas comedians had of property, propriety and performance. While
Alternative Comedy was highly critical of Thatcherism and neoliberalism, it owed its existence to these
modes of state management. The paper contends, then, that comedy can be seen as a form of class
struggle and should not be judged by its capacity to be a mere instrument of resistance, or condemned
by some spurious inability to achieve this. The paper concludes by considering the development of
comedy production since the 1980s. -
Donmez P, Sutton A, 'British Immigration Policy, Depoliticisation and Brexit'
Comparative European Politics 18 (2020) pp.659-688
ISSN: 1472-4790 eISSN: 1740-388XAbstractPublished here Open Access on RADARThis paper seeks to problematize the historical significance of the EU for British governing strategy with reference to immigration policy and the concept of depoliticisation. Situating British governing strategy in terms of the crisis-prone nature of capitalist society, this paper argues that British immigration policy has been depoliticised through, initially, the invocation of globalisation and, more recently, the EU. Through this strategy, the British state has been able to repeatedly claim that immigration policy is largely out of its hands, as they have no control over workers wishing to enter Britain looking for work. This paper makes three claims: firstly, immigration policy has been used as a means by both Conservative and Labour governments to manage inflation and labour; secondly, successive governments have sought to depoliticise immigration policy through
reference to external forces; thirdly, this strategy of depoliticisation ultimately failed, politicising Britain’s relationship with the EU and creating conditions for Britain’s exit from the EU. -
Brassett J, Sutton A, 'British Satire, Everyday Politics: Chris Morris, Armando Iannucci and Charlie Brooker'
The British Journal of Politics and International Relations 19 (2) (2017) pp.245-262
ISSN: 1369-1481 eISSN: 1467-856XAbstractPublished hereThis article develops a critical engagement with the politics of British satire. After first engaging the mainstream critique of satire—that it promotes cynicism and apathy by portraying politicians in stereotypically corrupt terms—we develop a performative approach to comedy as an everyday vernacular of political life. Beyond a focus on ‘impact’, we suggest that satire can be read as an everyday form of political reflection that performs within a social context. This argument yields an image of Morris, Iannucci and Brooker as important critics of contemporary British politics, a point which we explore through their interventions on media form, political tragedy and political agency.
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Sutton A, 'Depoliticisation and the Politics of Imperialism'
British Politics 12 (2) (2016) pp.209-230
ISSN: 1746-918X eISSN: 1746-9198AbstractPublished hereApproaches to depoliticisation have tended to focus on its use as a domestic strategy. Where the literature tends to be lacking is in consideration of its international role. This article examines the way in which imperialist policies have been depoliticized through technically managed or apparently economic institutions. It explores the way in which British imperial strategy was depoliticised by the use of the Sterling Area, analysing an episode in British-Malayan relations in which the apolitical character of the Sterling Area was brought into question.
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Sutton A, 'British Imperialism and the Political Economy of Malayan Independence'
The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History 44 (3) (2016) pp.470-491
ISSN: 0308-6534 eISSN: 1743-9329AbstractPublished hereThe article focuses on Britain’s relationship with Malaya shortly before and after its independence from the British Empire. The article looks at the negotiations concerning the financial settlement prior to independence. Britain sought to keep Malaya within the sterling area at all costs, even after de jure convertibility had been achieved, due to its high dollar earning capacity, which remained important due to persistent trade deficits with the US from the end of the Second World War. The article argues that this settlement, while seemingly very generous for an independent Malaya, was still very much intended to maintain Britain’s role within the global economy, to ensure sterling’s status as an international currency and to support conditions for British economic growth.
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Donmez P, Sutton A, 'Revisiting the Debate on Open Marxist Perspectives'
The British Journal of Politics and International Relations 18 (3) (2016) pp.688-705
ISSN: 1369-1481 eISSN: 1467-856XAbstractPublished hereThis article seeks to review the recent incarnation of a long-standing engagement in international political economy (IPE) and critical theory between open Marxist perspectives (OMPs) and their critics. The article aims to identify the enduring relevance of this debate in order to think about the possibility and future of critical social inquiry in our time constructively. It criticises elements on both sides of the debate that no longer serve but rather hinder achieving this objective. We argue that the recent criticisms make a number of important constructive points that could help enhance the explanatory power of OMPs yet still portray the latter uncharitably. We propose to take the emphasis on openness in OMPs seriously as a scholarly and political orientation without immersing the debate with the charges of reductionism, instrumentalism, determinism and functionalism which are frequently raised by various versions of Marxism against one another—often to little avail.
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Sutton A, 'Towards an Open Marxist Theory of Imperialism'
Capital & Class 37 (2) (2013) pp.217-237
ISSN: 0309-8168 eISSN: 2041-0980AbstractPublished here Open Access on RADARThe purpose of the paper is to provide the basis for a theory of imperialism that is consonant with open Marxism. The need for an open Marxist theory of imperialism derives from two sources: firstly, a critique from open Marxism of extant theories of imperialism that they treat contingent factors as necessary elements of imperialism. Secondly, and certainly a less theoretical point, is the obvious and intuitive value of an account of imperialism. Where states compete to immobilise capital within their own territory, this leads to unequal relationships between states, one of which is imperialism. It is essential to understand what the nature of this relationship is if we are to understand capitalism on a global scale, which is to say at all. This can only be accomplished by understanding what the state is, how it is constituted and what its function is within society. Open Marxism is particularly well placed to accomplish this. The paper argues that accounts of imperialism heretofore have been contingent and focused on the appearance of imperialism
and spent little time considering its essence as a manifestation of the state’s power and desire to maintain the circuit of capital both nationally and internationally. The paper then seeks to show that open Marxism is well placed to achieve this and to move towards an idea of an open Marxist theory of imperialism.
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Kettell S, Sutton A, 'New Imperialism: Towards a Holistic Approach'
International Studies Review 15 (2) (2013) pp.243-258
ISSN: 1521-9488 eISSN: 1468-2486AbstractPublished here Open Access on RADARA prominent theme in scholarly analyses of contemporary international affairs concerns the extent to which the unrivalled power and activities of the United States can be said to constitute a form of imperialism. Typically, the contours of this debate centre on the ostensible differences between 'old' and 'new' varieties of imperialist practice. Yet the concept of 'new imperialism' remains one on which little consensus exists. Wide differences of opinion on its origins, dynamics and characteristics are evident, as is an analytical bifurcation between distinct 'economic' and 'geopolitical' explanations. This absence of conceptual unity leads to accounts of new imperialist strategy that are partial, limited and incomplete. If the theoretical value of new imperialism is to be realised, a more holistic approach is needed. To this end, some of the key differences between the contexts of new and old imperialism are explored. The paper concludes that a holistic approach requires an appreciation of imperialism as a strategic choice that springs forth from the intersection of the goals and perceptions held by, as well as the constraints on and opportunities available to, state managers. The distinct environment within which this choice is made provides the novelty of contemporary imperialism, and the particular nature of this environment is further explored in this paper.
Books
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Sutton A, The Political Economy of Imperial Relations: Britain, the Sterling Area, and Malaya 1945-1960, Palgrave Macmillan (2015)
ISBN: 9781137373977 eISBN: 9781137373984AbstractPublished hereThe Political Economy of Imperial Relations offers a much needed historical and theoretical intervention into the relationship between Britain and Malaya after the Second World War. It challenges existing accounts and details a strong continuity in this relationship from 1945 until 1960.
Book chapters
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Sutton A, 'Marxism and Imperialism' in Ness I, Cope Z (ed.), The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Imperialism and Anti-Imperialism, Palgrave Macmillan (2015)
ISBN: 9780230392779 eISBN: 9780230392786AbstractPublished here Open Access on RADARThe relationship between Marxism and imperialism has been established since the writings of Marx himself. Particularly in Capital, Volume I, Marx discusses the international division of labour caused by the expansion of capital in Ch.15, English capital in Ireland in Ch.25, as well as engaging with a theory of colonialism in Ch.33 ([1867] 1992a). Marx’s own views on both colonialism and imperialism have been well discussed in critical analysis of both his well- and lesser-known texts, many of which are presented in the compendium text ‘On Colonialism’ (Marx & Engels 2001; see, also, Pradella 2013; Nimtz 2002). However, the study of imperialism post-Marx grew from a belief that, while some analysis of imperialism was present in the works of Marx, a dedicated analysis of the state and the international sphere had been left at an embryonic stage. This is broadly true but this view has received criticism based on historiographical analysis of both Marx and the earliest authors on imperialism (Pradella 2013). The phenomenon of imperialism, while still discussed by Marx in a number of instances, was not given the same sustained critical attention as other issues in Marx’s work. This is the point at which Marxism’s engagement with imperialism becomes more profound and substantial. Imperialism, therefore, to Marxism has always been a ‘problem’ of some form.
Indeed, the ‘problem’ of imperialism derives from a number of perceived sources: gaps in Marx’s own writing; an explanation for why capitalism endures; an account of the phenomenon of globalisation. It is the contention of this chapter, then, that the on-going relationship between Marxism and imperialism reveals one of Marxism’s main strengths, and its clear weaknesses. It reveals Marxism’s capacity to explain new phenomena coupled with a rigorous and critical method; however, it also reveals a reliance on systemic explanations for contingent developments, and a considerable partisanship between radical thinkers.
This relationship between Marxism and imperialism therefore begins early in the 20th Century with the work of the ‘classical’ authors of imperialism, building on the work of Marx and critiquing extant understandings of imperialism, particularly John Hobson’s. This chapter charts the origins of this relationship and its various iterations throughout the 20th century until the present. This relationship has, fundamentally, changed very little, deriving largely from Marx’s own work, and the work of the first Marxist theorists of imperialism. Indeed, the relationship is iterative rather than developmental, with particular ideas within Marxist theories of imperialism recurring perpetually. Most notably, the overarching power of Finance, or monopoly capital, within capitalism, and the idea of imperialism as a qualitatively distinct ‘stage’ of capitalist development are extremely powerful ideas within the tradition of Marxist theories of imperialism.
The paper will be split into three sections according to various ‘phases’ of Marxist thought on imperialism: firstly, the ‘classical’ Marxists, from Hilferding to Lenin; secondly, the ‘neo- Colonialist’ thinkers; and finally, the ‘New’ imperialists.