Communication and Motivation

When explaining ones research to a non-expert audience, it is important to highlight its importance outside of the intrinsic value of knowledge. In the case of my work, this is not too difficult. While at first a lay-person might be skeptical of why they should care about what happened with Anarchism in the 19th century, the fact that this work is inherently political means everyone has some baseline interest in it.

I can explain how the forces I discuss which shaped anarchism also shaped more mainstream ideologies like liberalism and social democracy, and the effects of these changes can be seen even today. Further, I can argue that looking at political change through an economic lens gives us tools and insights which can be applied to our time, and thus to political issues which everyone today has a vested interest in.

In order to make clear why economic developments may shape politics and political ideologies i can employ metaphors and analogies. For example, when you think of sports, it is often the case that technological developments (the economics) cause problems which necessitate rule changes (the politics) for the game. This happened in American Football when face-masks became popular, and the league had to implements rules against pulling someone down by their (very grab able) mask.

Career Goals

My current career goals involve bouncing around between academia (in economics) and the private sector. Thus, i will need to interact with a wide variety of people, many of whom will not be experts in my field. This may include my boss, co-workers at firms, or even potential consumers/investors. In each case, it will be important that I and able to clearly and effectively communicate the core ideas of my work without getting bogged down in jargon and minutiae.