About
Clara E. Mattei, Ph.D., is a professor of economics at The University of Tulsa and the founding president of the Forum for Real Economic Emancipation (FREE), where she hosts the weekly FREE podcast.
Mattei was previously associate professor at The New School for Social Research Economics Department and has been a fellow of the Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton. Her research contributes to the analysis and history of capitalism, exploring the critical relation between economic ideas and technocratic policymaking.
Her first book, “Capital Order: How Economists Invented Austerity and Paved the Way to Fascism” (University of Chicago Press, November 2022), has been translated into over a dozen languages. It was named one of the Financial Times’ 10 best economics books of 2022 and was awarded the 2023 Baxter Adams Prize from the American Historical Association, as well as the 2026 Hans Matthöfer Prize in Germany. The book investigates the origins of austerity in the aftermath of the First World War, uncovering its logic as a tool of reaction deployed against alternatives to capitalism.
Clara recently published her trade book “Escape From Capitalism” (Allen Lane, Penguin Press and Simon & Schuster, January 2026), which will soon be translated into multiple languages, including French, German and Italian.
She is currently working on a book project that critically reassesses the golden age of capitalism (1945-1975) and its Keynesianism through the lens of austerity capitalism.
Her writings have appeared, among other venues, in the Guardian, Jacobin, the Nation and Il Fatto Quotidiano, the Italian national newspaper to which she regularly contributes.
Awards and Honors
- Hans Matthöfer Prize for Economic Publishing Economics, Germany, 2026
- Distinguished Teaching Award, New School, Finalist, August 2024
- Moynihan Public Scholar, CUNY, June 2024
- Falling Walls Foundation, Science Summit Finalist, October 2023
- Herbert Baxter Adams Prize Award Winner from the American Historical Association, March 2023
- Federico Caffé Prize for the Italian Translation of The Capital Order, December 2022
- A Best Book in Economics in 2022 from the Financial Times, New York, USA, 2021/2022
- Institute for Advanced Studies, School of Social Sciences, Member and Fellow, Princeton, USA, 2018/2019
Education
- Ph.D., Economics, Sant’Anna School for Advanced Studies, Italy
- Master in Philosophy, University of Pavia, Italy
- B.A., Philosophy, University of Pavia, Italy, and Cambridge University, UK
Research interests and areas of expertise
- Political economy
- History of economic thought
- History of capitalism
- Methodology
