Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - Integrative Research Institute Law & Society (LSI)

In the workshop, the two authors and sociologists Céline Bessière (Université Paris- Dauphine) and Sibylle Gollac (CNRS) will present their book "Le Genre du Capital. Comment la Famille Reproduit les Inégalités" (2020). In it, they examined how economic (power) relations play out within families and powerfully demonstrate why we need the perspective of gender studies to understand the inequitable distribution of capital. To do this, Bessiére and Gollac looked at the work of law firms, notary publics, and family courts in the light of the history, sociology, and economics of the family. The book will be published this year in English translation by Harvard University Press.

The workshop takes this innovative, interdisciplinary research as a starting point to explore interdisciplinary approaches to questions of inequality/equality more generally. In this context, Dr. Katia Getel (Deputy Director of the Centre Marc Bloch) and Prof. Dr. Philipp Lersch (Humboldt University Berlin) will comment on the book.

Céline Bessière is a Professor of sociology at Paris Dauphine University (PSL University). She studies the material, economic and legal dimensions of family, in particular through the analysis of inheritance and marital breakdown. Her research is at the crossroads of several fields: sociology of law and justice, sociology of gender and family, and economic sociology.

Sibylle Gollac is a researcher at the CNRS in the areas of gender, inheritance, family, and combination ethnography/statistics.