I’m a historian of political thought, interested in the interrelation between capitalism and democracy. More specifically, my work focuses on the question of how capitalism — here understood as a system of generalised market dependence — both enables and constrains political thinking and acting, generating specific visions of democracy, distribution and representation.

After finishing my BA in Politics & Philosophy at the University of Essex in 2012, I took an MPhil in Cambridge in Political Thought and Intellectual History in 2015. My 2020 doctoral dissertation at Cambridge (‘Populism and the Democracy of Producers in the United States, 1877-1925’) focused on the political philosophy of the late nineteenth-century American Populist movement.

I’m currently working on three projects. The first is a global history of basic income, written with Daniel Zamora (Université Libre de Bruxelles), to be published by University of Chicago Press in 2022. My second project at the FWO derives from my doctoral dissertation at Cambridge, and focuses on an intellectual history of the American Populist Movement. The book is currently under contract with Harvard University Press. Finally, I am also writing a more public account of the populist decade from 2008 onwards for Verso Books, co-authored with Arthur Borriello (Université Libre de Bruxelles).

My academic work has appeared in journals such as The Historical Journal, History of Political Thought, American Political Thought, nonsite, Constellations, The Journal Of Political Ideologies, boundary2, and Political Inquiry. My public writing can be found in outlets such as the New Statesman, The Guardian, Tribune, Phenomenal World, De Groene Amsterdammer, and Jacobin.

A full list of my publications can be found here.

Featuring this expert

Basic Income: A Global History

Video | Apr 5, 2023

Anton Jäger discusses his new book “Welfare for Markets: A Global History of Basic Income” co-authored with Daniel Zamora Vargas.