5th ISA Forum of Sociology (6-11 July 2025)

This open call for papers seeks theoretically-driven empirical research that investigates finance as social relationships, as well as papers that directly refute this framing. More broadly, how does the meaning-making that infuses our lives shape ongoing financial relationships? For example, if financial instruments, products, and services are social relationships, how are they embedded in racial and gender systems, and with what consequences? If financial products are conceived of as commodity chains—a string of interorganizational relationships stretching across time and space—how is finance racialized and gendered? If religious ideas permeate many people’s lives, how do these shape financial behaviors, products, and markets? At the level of organizations, how does viewing debt and equity as relationships alter our understanding of the behavior of households, firms, corporations, municipalities, states, or transnational regions? At the level of financial instruments and markets, how are bonds, mortgages, and equity products created, marketed, and consumed? These broad questions are merely indicative of the wide range of research welcome in this panel.

Two types of theoretically-driven empirical papers will be given preference. First, research conducted outside of the North Atlantic, with a strong preference for research in Africa and the Islamic world. Second, research that addresses gender and/or racial systems. Nevertheless, research in either category is rare, and therefore all research that fits the session description are welcome.