University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada

July 21 – July 23, 2026

With financial support from the World Society Foundation (Zurich, Switzerland) and the Climate & Society Lab at the University of British Columbia (UBC), the newly formed Global Political Economy Network (GPEN) is pleased to announce a conference to be held at UBC, from July 21 to July 23, 2026. The conference theme is Globalizing Political Economy: Launching the Global Political Economy Network, and we invite paper submissions that address this theme from various methodological and theoretical approaches. The goal of this conference is to highlight the Global Political Economy perspective on topics of current interest and study by sociologists and other social scientists. 

What is Global Political Economy?

Political Economy (PE) is the study of interrelationships between the economy and polity. International Political Economy (IPE) shifts the focus to the interrelations between national economies and polities. Global Political Economy (GPE) encompasses both. Like PE, it concerns itself with both economic and political outcomes and assumes these are mutually constitutive and interact in space and time. Like IPE, it frequently shifts its focus to macro-level phenomenon. What makes GPE distinctive is that its unit of analysis is, first and foremost, the global economy and polity as it varies structurally and historically. That is, if citizen’s economic and political preferences are functions of their position in an economic system (PE) and if states aggregate these interests (IPE), then historically and structurally varying characteristics of the global economy and polity impact these lower-level processes. Theoretically, GPE scholars are agnostic, or at least heterogeneous, and draw flexibly from theories that originated in industrial transformations in Europe and elsewhere. Methodologically, GPE scholars are committed to the scientific method and draw broadly from both quantitative and qualitative approaches that encompass various units of observation, periods of time, and bases of comparison. Because almost any social phenomenon is shaped at least in part by the global economy and polity, GPE scholars are substantively diverse but converge around common questions regarding such topics as development, inequality, the climate crisis, population health, labor, migration, and governance.

Conference Topics

We welcome original research on all substantive topics that are examined within a Global Political Economy framework.

Proposal Submissions

Please submit an abstract of no more than 300 words to the chair of the conference organizing committee (andrew.jorgenson@ubc.ca) no later than November 1, 2025. We will send out acceptance notifications by December 15, 2025. Full drafts of papers should be submitted by April 1, 2026. Notification of acceptance of full papers for the conference will be announced via email no later than May 1, 2026.

Conference Housing

Lodging will be available on campus in walking distance to the conference venue.

Travel Support

Financial support to help cover travel costs will be available for presenters. If you would like to be considered for financial support, please indicate this in your email when submitting your abstract.

Publication Opportunities

The organizers anticipate editing a special issue of the journal Sociology of Development and publishing an edited volume with the World Society Foundation consisting of papers from the conference.