Association for Evolutionary Economics (AFEE) @ ASSA Meetings

January 3-5, 2027 (Sunday, Monday & Tuesday)
Washington, DC

Institutional Economics at its Frontiers:
Global Challenges, New Methods, Enduring Questions

 

Institutional economics has evolved at the intersection of theory, method, and real-world problems. From its origins, the institutionalist tradition has sought to understand economic life as historically situated, socially embedded, and shaped by power, norms, and collective action. Today, institutional economists confront a set of global challenges; namely, rising inequality, ecological crisis, geopolitical fragmentation, transformations of work and production, and crises of governance and legitimacy that demand renewed analytical tools and methodological creativity.

The theme of the 2027 AFEE conference sessions invites contributions that explore the frontiers of institutional economics: conceptual, methodological, empirical, and geographical. We encourage papers that push institutionalist analysis in new directions while engaging enduring questions about economic power, institutional change, social provisioning, and public purpose. Contributions may draw on diverse methods, comparative perspectives, and interdisciplinary approaches, and may address institutions operating at local, national, regional, or global levels.

The aim of the conference is not to define a single frontier, but to provide a space for institutional economists to reflect on how the field can continue to evolve while remaining grounded in realism, historical inquiry, and policy relevance.

Indicative Topics for Proposals:
Without intending to limit the scope of submissions, contributions (as single papers, panels, or co-sponsored sessions) may address themes including, but not limited to:

1. Conceptual and Theoretical Frontiers

• • New developments in Original Institutional Economics
  • Reassessments of core institutionalist concepts such as power, value, social control, and working rules
  • Institutional change, stability, and path dependence
  • Evolutionary and historical approaches to economic analysis
  • Revisiting and extending the work of inter alia Veblen, Commons, Ayres, Galbraith, Polanyi, and related traditions
  • Institutional economics in dialogue with e.g. feminist, Marxian, post-Keynesian, ecological, or decolonial approaches

2. Methodological Frontiers and Pluralism

• • Methodological pluralism in institutional economics
  • Qualitative, historical, archival, and ethnographic methods
  • Mixed-methods and interdisciplinary research strategies
  • Institutional analyses of data, measurement, and quantification
  • Critiques of formalism, model-driven empiricism, and methodological reductionism
  • Methodological challenges in studying power, norms, and informal institutions

3. Global and Comparative Institutional Analysis

• • Institutional economics beyond the Global North
  • Comparative institutional analysis across regions and development trajectories
  • Colonial legacies, imperialism, and institutional persistence
  • Global governance, international organizations, and rule-making
  • Varieties of capitalism in a fragmented global economy
  • Transnational corporations, global value chains, and institutional power

4. Institutions, Power, and Contemporary Challenges

• • Economic power, inequality, and institutional design
  • Financialization and institutional transformation
  • Institutions and ecological crisis; climate governance and just transition
  • Labor markets, precarity, automation, and platform economies
  • Institutions of care, social reproduction, and welfare provision
  • Crisis management, resilience, and institutional failure

Submissions can be done as standalone (individual or co-authored) papers, closed panels (4 to 5 papers), or co-sponsored sessions. Co-sponsored sessions with other organizations are particularly welcomed. Past joint AFEE sessions include the Association for Social Economics (ASE), the History of Economics Society (HES), the Union for Radical Political Economics (URPE), and the International Association for Feminist Economics (IAFFE). 

Panel or sessions proposals that do not account for the usual common sense diversity practices will be required to “revise and resubmit”.

AFEE at ICAPE:
Proposals for papers and panels that are accepted but cannot be accommodated on the AFEE program due to space limitations will be considered for inclusion in the AFEE-sponsored sessions at the ICAPE conference (International Confederation of Associations for Pluralism in Economics), taking place immediately after the ASSA conference on 5^th and 6^th January at American University in Washington DC.

AFEE at ICAPE sessions will have the ICAPE registration cost reimbursed by AFEE if requested.

Papers presented at the AFEE-sponsored ICAPE sessions will be eligible for publication in the June issue of the JEI (details below).

Submission Requirements and Procedures:
The deadline for submissions is 1^st April 2026. Late submissions will not be considered. Acceptance notifications will be issued by mid-summer.

Membership Requirement:
At least one of the authors of any paper and each person participating in a panel must be a current AFEE member.

If you are uncertain about your membership status, you can check it and renew it at https://www.afee.net. If you are not a member you may join AFEE at https://afee.net/become-a-member/. You also may do so by contacting Thomas Kemp (AFEE Secretary-Treasurer) at [email protected] or Teresa Rowell (AFEE Coordinator) at [email protected].

Conference registration and hotel information can be found directly at ASSA’s webpage: https://www.aeaweb.org/conference/.

In-Person Participation Requirement:
AFEE at ASSA requires in-person participation. AFEE at ICAPE may accommodate virtual participation.  If you do not intend to participate in AFEE at ASSA in-person, please advise with your submission and presentation at AFEE at ICAPE will be considered.

June Issue of the Journal of Economic Issues:

Papers presented at AFEE sessions at ASSA and ICAPE are eligible for consideration for publication in the June issue of the Journal of Economic Issues, subject to the journal’s submission guidelines and deadlines.

To be considered for publication:

• Text of the paper cannot exceed 3,000 words.
• The paper cannot include more than four pages (total) of double-spaced endnotes, references, tables and figures.
• The full paper meeting the above requirements must be submitted no later than December 15, 2026 to William Waller, Editor of the JEI, as an email attachment to [email protected].

We look forward to your submissions!

Danielle Guizzo
University of Bristol (UK)
AFEE-President Elect (2026)

For questions or submission issues, please contact me at [email protected]