#AcademicRunPlaylist - 12/1/25

Well the family is sick again, and while taking care of the household I listened to some talks for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was an interesting session on innovation ecosystems with a focus on Australia at the University of Technology Sydney with John H Howard, Roy Green, Mat Howard, Bronwyn Fox, Michael Priddis, and Davor Jozic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVla51gtqvQ

Next was a great conversation with Greg Burke and Riley League on crowdfunding compliance on the Business Scholarship Podcast https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-HSsjYUlLM

Next was an excellent discussion with Devyani Sharma on defining accents and understanding how they impact outcomes on the Social Science Bites podcast. Highly recommend https://socialsciencebites.libsyn.com/devyani-sharma-on-accents

Next was "The Art and Practice of Corporate Governance" by David Larcker and Brian Tayan. This is an excellent introduction to the mainstream view of corporate governance, with Larcker and Tayan covering a ton of ground in this compact volume. The book isn't prescriptive, instead laying out much of the research around the standard view of what occupies corporate boards and leaving it to the reader to determine whether that makes sense or not. There are, of course, some major issues with this which the authors do call out - how much do CEOs actually matter? What does "ESG" even mean? I would've liked some more direct grappling with these questions, and given that so much of the research that's reviewed here fails basic statistics and causality tests I think it would have been better to either expand the book or shorten the section on ESG. Nevertheless, this is a great book on an essential topic even if you're not on a board. Highly recommend https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/faculty-research/books/art-practice-corporate-governance

Next was "Capital in the 21st Century" by Thomas Piketty. I finally got around to reading Pikkety's breakout book, and I can report that it's a classic for a reason. With his now trademark deep research and quantitative rigor, Piketty examines the nature of the global financial system and why inequality builds over time. There are some flaws in here, particularly around the economic history of the Americas, and a lot of space is spent on monetary policy with very little payoff. From this perspective this book can be viewed as an unfinished version of Piketty's more recent books which are superior in nearly every way. If you want to go back to the original, however, you'll still be in for a treat. Highly recommend https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780674430006

Last was "The Essential Dōgen," edited by Kazuaki Tanahashi and Peter Levitt. This is a good, compact collection of some of Dōgen's writings, with a nice introduction and some commentary before each section. As a piece of philosophical writing it's interesting in and of itself and provides some insight into more modern norms in Japan. I would've liked more commentary and analysis here, however, since as a beginner in this space it's difficult to fully appreciate the context of these writings. As a first introduction, however, this book serves as a good jumping off point. Highly recommend https://www.shambhala.com/the-essential-dogen-2478.html