Political economy, in its various guises and transfigurations, is a research philosophy that presents both social commentary and theoretical progress and is concerned with a number of different topics: politics, regulation and governance, production systems, social relations, inequality and development amongst many others. As a critical theory, political economy seeks to provide an understanding of societies and of the structures and social relations that form them in order to evoke social change toward more equitable conditions.

Despite the early influence of critical development...