Students’ Research

Masters Students

Aishwarya Bhattacharyya  |  Capitalism accumulation, wages and class struggle in India (MA, Development Studies, 2019–)

Catalina Perez  |  Capitalists, industrial development policy, and the state: A case study of Colombia (MA, Development Studies, 2015–17)

Ashley Chen  |  Capitalism and child labour (MA, 2011–13)

Ashley works as a teacher. Ashley has written for the progressive press and engages in activities aimed at promoting a progressive  culture.

She has co-authored an academic article on violence against the child worker:

Das, R. J., and Chen, A. Towards a Theoretical Framework for Understanding Capitalist Violence Against Child Labour. World Review of Political Economy, 10: 2(2019), 191-219.

Asutosha Acharya  |  Critical reflections on Lenin’s Development of Capitalism in Russia (MA, 2010–12)

Asutosha works as a researcher on the issue of financial crimes in relation to government regulation in Toronto’s financial industry. He is highly knowledgeable about the dialectical connection between criminality and capitalism and is writing about this for presentation at MELLT and at York. Asutosha is engaged in civic/community activities within a section of the South Asian diaspora in the GTA, seeking to contribute to people’s progressive consciousness, where possible, including by using his talent as a stand-up comedian.

Leah Landry  |  The poor and decentralized institutions of governance in India (MA research project, 2010–12)

Leah is working in community development in health promotion and access to justice in the non-profit sector.

Robert Bridi  |  Immigrant agricultural workers in Ontario (MA, 2008–10)

Anurupa Roy  |  The political economy of labour process in call centers in Kolkata, India (MA thesis, 2004–06)

Anurupa went on to do her PhD with Kevin Cox at the Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio and now teaches a number of courses on a contract basis at SUNY, Albany. Her publications include:

Roy, A. 2016 Class Politics in the (Re)Making of Space: Displacing the Urban Poor in Kolkata, India. Human Geography 9(3), pp.43-62

 

PhD Students

Josh Watterton  |  The global tendency towards the rate of profit to fall and the capitalist state: A comparative study of Asia and North America (provisional PhD topic, 2019–)

Smith, Murray, Butovsky, Jonah, and Watterton, Josh. 2021. Twilight capitalism: Karl Marx and decay of the profit system. Black Point, Nova Scotia: Fernwood press.

Watterton, Josh. 2020. A review of World in Crisis: A Global Analysis of Marx’s Law of Profitability, ed. Guglielmo Carchedi and Michael Roberts. Science & Society, 84:, 292–294 (a refereed book review)

Rupinder Minhas | History of the communist movement in India (PhD, 2015–)

Mikati, M. and Minhas, M. 2017. ‘Nature, Time and Historical Materialism’. Science and Society, 81:3, 414‒20.

Jarren Richards  |  The state, neoliberalism, and industrialization in India (PhD, 2014–)

Jarren is a recipient of major awards, including from Mitacs and the York Centre for Asian Research.  He also received the Shastri Doctoral Fellowship (unable to utilize the funds) as well as the York Knowledge Mobilization Fund.

Charvaak Pati  |  Neoliberal capitalism and workers’ struggle in India (PhD, 2011–)

Charvaak is an Assistant Professor at Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Patna, India. He is Assistant editor of the Journal of Migration Affairs. His publications include:

Pati, C. 2019. Spaces of Alienation and Resistance. In S. Rajan and M. Sumeetha eds. Handbook of Internal Migration in India. Delhi/Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Pati, C. 2014. Review of The Meanings of Work: Essay on the Affirmation and Negation of Work, by Ricardo Antunes. Science and Society, 78:3, 414‒16. (a refereed book review)

Mizhar Mikati  |  The international food crisis of 2008: A geographical investigation of the Egyptian context (PhD, 2011–20)

While at York, Mizhar received major awards, including from SSHRC and Ontario Government. Mizhar’s publications include:

Mikati, M. Global agrarian change and food crises: Relations and generative mechanisms of food insecurity. Leiden: Brill (under contract).

Mikati, M. 2018. ‘For a Dialectics of Nature and Need: Unity, Separation, and Alienation’, Capitalism Nature Socialism, Vol. 31:1, pp. 34-51

Mikati, M and Minhas, M. 2017. ‘Nature, Time, and Historical Materialism’. Science and Society, 81:3, 414‒20

Ritika Shrimali  |  Corporate control in agriculture: A critical study of contract farming in the Indian state of Punjab (PhD, 2007–14)

Ritika is teaches at the Centre for Global Studies, Huron University College, University of Western Ontario. Her publications include:

Shrimali, R. 2021. Corporatisation of India agriculture: Case of Contract Farming in Indian Punjab. Palgrave. (Forthcoming).

Shrimali, R. 2021. Review of Big Farms Make Big Flu: Dispatches on Infectious Disease, Agribusiness, and the Nature of Science by Rob Wallace, Science & Society, vol. 85:1.  (a refereed book review)

Shrimali, R. 2020. ‘Commentary on the ongoing Agrarian Struggle and its relation with corporatisation of Indian Agriculture’, in Noaman G. Ali’s Introduction to Political Economy.

Shrimali, R. 2020. ‘Contract farming as a means of ushering in corporatisation in agriculture’. Frontline (November 6).

Shrimali, R. 2016. Accumulation by dispossession or accumulation without dispossession: the case of contract farming in India. Human Geography: A New Radical Journal, 9:3, 77-88

Sudarshana Bordoloi  |  Political economy of uneven rural development: The case of the nonfarm sector in Kerala, India (PhD,  2007–13)

Sudarshana is an Assistant Professor (tenure track) of Geography at Minnesota State University, Mankato. Her publications include:

Bordoloi, S. 2020. Political Economy of Uneven Rural Development: The Case of the Nonfarm Sector in Kerala, India, Palgrave Macmillan.

Bordoloi, S. 2017. ‘The Rural Nonfarm Sector in Flexible Capitalism: The Coir Industry in Kerala, India’. Human Geography: A New Radical Journal, 10:1, pp. 50-66.

Bordoloi, S. and Das, R. J. 2017. ‘Modernization Theory’. In D. Richardson, N. Castree, M. F. Goodchild, A. Kobayashi, W. Liu and R. A. Marston. (eds).  International Encyclopedia of Geography: People, the Earth, Environment and Technology. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons.

Robert Bridi  |  The political economy of biotechnology in Canada (PhD, 2010–16)

Robert is an Assistant Professor of Geography, United Arab Emirates University (UAEU).

While at York, Robert received major awards, including from SSHRC (a three-year award).

At UAEU, Robert won a major grant in 2019 to conduct research on the topic of sustainable transport. His publications include:

Bridi, R. Political Economy of Biotechnology in Canada, Leiden: Brill. (under contract)

Bridi, R. 2020. ‘Spaces of alienation in the tobacco fields: the case of migrant workers in Ontario, Canada’. GeoJournal. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10708-020-10238-9

Bridi, R. 2016. ‘The State, Civil Society, and the Canadian Agricultural Biotechnology Industry’. Human Geography: A New Radical Journal, Vol. 9:3, 89-109

Bridi, R. 2015. ‘Migrant Workers in Ontario’s Tobacco Belt: An Examination of Workplace Dynamics’, Human Geography: A New Radical Journal, Vol. 8:1, pp. 54-67.

Bridi, R. 2013. ‘Labour control in the tobacco agro-spaces: Migrant agricultural workers in South Western Ontario’, Antipode, vol. 45:5, pp 1070-1089.

Das, R. J. and Bridi, R. 2013. “Globalization.” In Oxford Bibliographies in Geography. Ed. Barney Warf. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013.