Johnna Montgomerie

Professor

Office: Scarfe 2110
Phone: 604-822-5298

Research Interests
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Research Interests

  • Home economics and the political economy of everyday life
  • Money, debt and household financial management
  • Financial literacy and public education about money
  • Research methods and methodologies
  • Pedagogy and Curriculum Studies
Biography
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Biography

Dr. Johnna Montgomerie is a Professor in the Department of Curriculum and Pedagogy, she was born in Toronto and raised in Vancouver, she pursued postgraduate studies in the UK, obtaining her DPhil from the University of Sussex with a focus on the dynamic intersection of international political economy and social research methods.

With a remarkable seven-year tenure as a research fellow at the globally recognized Centre for Research on Socio-Cultural Change (CRESC) at the University of Manchester, Dr. Montgomerie positioned herself as an interdisciplinary scholar of money, debt and financialization. She has held appointments as a Senior Lecturer in Economics at Goldsmiths College, University of London, and as a Professor of International Political Economy at King’s College, University of London.

Dr. Montgomerie’s commitment is to fostering interdisciplinary collaboration across the Faculties of Arts and Humanities, Social Science, Business and Education. Her groundbreaking interdisciplinary scholarship, focusing on money, debt, and inequality, showcases her multifaceted roles as a researcher, educator, and social justice advocate. The cornerstone of her contribution lies in redefining the study of political economy and enhancing the teaching of ‘the economy’ across diverse academic disciplines.

Specializing in money, distribution, and household management, Dr. Montgomerie applies feminist and institutionalist theories to analyze the intimate relationship between debt and inequality. Her extensive portfolio includes impactful publications in peer-reviewed journals, monographs, teaching-centric volumes, handbooks, and accessible open-access materials for wider audiences. The enduring relevance of her scholarship is underscored by the mounting levels of debt and the formidable challenges posed by inequality.

Dr. Montgomerie weaves her original research on money, debt, and inequality into academic instruction, community engagement, and public interest initiatives. Her community-based research on financial education actively collaborates with social justice organizations, propelling progressive public policy initiatives. Notably, her work explores community practices such as ‘money advice,’ ‘money talks,’ and ‘debt audits,’ uniting various organizations and activists to delve into the experiences of inequality and hardship in everyday life.

Beyond academia, Dr. Montgomerie’s participates in cultural events like the London Southbank Festival of Ideas and the Manchester International Festival. Her contributions to activist films like “Bank Job” and “Money Puzzles” vividly portray aspects of her research, illustrating the real-world challenges faced by individuals, households, and communities. Complementing her outreach are three podcast mini-series, solidifying her commitment to opening new pathways to impact from academia to wider society.

She routinely engages with the media, Dr. Montgomerie has made appearances on BBC News, BBC Radio 4 Thinking Allowed, ITV News, Radio 5 Live, London Broadcast Radio, China’s CGTV, and Germany’s ZDF. Through these channels, she raises awareness about pressing issues such as money, debt, financial pressures on households, and inequality, making her a leading voice in the discourse on these critical subjects.

Research
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Research

My scholarship on money and debt advances a new perspective on socio-economic inequality. I use the concept of the household, or oikonomia, to examine how money systems operate in everyday life. I apply the Keynesian theory of money and the feminist theory of social reproduction to understand how the division of paid and unpaid labor is a key feature of distribution in the domestic sphere, both in the home and the national economy.

My research concentrates on Anglo-liberal countries—the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand—because their shared language and colonial history translate into institutions and politics that rely on residential housing and consumption for the domestic economy to grow. I use interpretive and mixed methods to generate new empirical insights. I analyze how money is managed by households to argue that debt is necessary for many individuals to access the complex system of housing, work, consumption, education, health, and social care. Furthermore, this pattern generates clear fault lines of inequality between social groups and communities.

Specifically, my research interrogates why debt is increasingly used to fuel growth in Anglo-liberal countries and how this impacts the daily life for different groups in society. I argue that debt generates new configurations of inequality not captured by income, wealth, or social capability measures. I use home economics as a method to empirically demonstrate how debt generates socio-cultural change. For example, debt has become necessary to access middle-class entitlements of university education, buying a home, owning a car, or even having a family holiday. Also, debt has become the main way for many families to access university education.

Debt is also central to the experience of poverty, as high-cost credit is often used to buy the necessities of life or simply to make ‘ends meet.’ I argue that when private debt is used in emergencies, such as ill health or periods of unemployment, it acts as a substitute for what was previously provided by public welfare. Also, when debt is used as temporary cash flow during major life events—getting married, having a baby, or accessing care for an elderly relative—it reaches into the very intimacies of family life in ways that generate pernicious forms of inequality.

My scholarship is built on my success in securing research council funding to conduct primary research and build international networks. My most recent grants allowed me to conduct in-depth qualitative research to ‘open the black-box of the household’ by analyzing the rival cultures of expertise between macro and home economics in public policy, with a follow-up project that examined debt-based and asset-based forms of inequality between households. Over my career, I have successfully managed over $500,000 in grant funding, and I continue to work within international networks and build consortia to secure additional grant funding for research on money, debt, and inequality.

I have published my research in a range of interdisciplinary and non-academic outlets, which demonstrates the academic relevance and political importance of debt and inequality as significant topics. My portfolio of publications is a balance between outlets and audiences: The 17 peer-reviewed journal articles are my contribution to advancing the academic literature. The 13 chapters in Handbooks and Edited Collections represent my contribution to research-led teaching for degrees across the arts, humanities, and social sciences. The 2 edited collections represent my contribution to advancing university teaching, and both of my monographs offer a synthesis of the latest research on debt and inequality to reach across disciplinary silos and audiences beyond the university. Similarly, my 11 open-access publications seek to provide students, policymakers, community organizers, and the general public with engaging new insights that pose big questions and/or offer small solutions.

My research continues, with new partners and collaborators, asking the following questions:

  • Economics in everyday life: what is the cause of rising debt levels? Is there a connection between debt and socio-cultural inequality?
  • Money and household finances: is budget management a form of social learning? Is financial literacy fit for purpose?
  • Research Methods: in what ways does interpretive and comparative research interrogate the structures of money and socio-cultural processes of money management? How can discourse analysis, case study and interviews be used to understand how money operates in everyday life?
  • Critical pedagogy: How can we (re)teach economics, financial literacy, and household money management using design thinking and innovative teaching practices?
Publications
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Publications

Peer Review Journal Articles

  1. Bourne, C., Gilbert, P., Haiven, M. and Montgomerie, J. (forthcoming) Editorial: Financial Capital and Ghosts of Empire, Journal of Cultural Economy, accepted in press
  2. Montgomerie, J. (2023). COVID Keynesianism: locating inequality in the Anglo-American crisis response, Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, 16(1), 211–223 https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsad003
  3. Montgomerie, J. and Tepe-Belfrage, D. (2018). “Spaces of Debt Resistance” Geoforum, 98(2), 309-317 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2018.05.012
  4. Montgomerie, J. and Tepe-Belfrage, D. (2017). “Caring for Debts: How the Household Economy Exposes the Limits of Financialisation”, Critical Sociology, 43 (4-5), 653-668
  5. Montgomerie, J. (2016). “Austerity and the Household” British Politics, 11 (4), 418-437
  6. Montgomerie, J.* and and Tepe-Belfrage, D. (2016). “A feminist moral-political economy of uneven reform in austerity Britain: Fostering financial and parental literacy.” Globalizations 13.6: 890-905.
  7. Stanley, L., Deville, J. and Montgomerie, J. (2015). “Digital Debt Management: The Everyday Life of Austerity” New Formations, 87 (7), 64-82
  8. Montgomerie, J.* and M. Büdenbender, (2015). “Round the Houses: the failures of housing as asset-based welfare”, New Political Economy, 20 (3), 386-405
  9. Montgomerie, J. (2013 ). “America’s debt safety-net”, Public Administration, 91(4), 871-888.
  10. Montgomerie, J. and Roscoe, S. (2013). “Owning the consumer—Getting to the core of the Apple business model.” Accounting Forum, 37(4), 290-299
  11. Bryan, D., Martin, R., Montgomerie, J. and Williams, K. (2012). “An important failure: knowledge limits and the financial crisis”, Economy and Society, 41(3), 299-315.
  12. Froud, J., Johal, S., Montgomerie, J. and Williams, K. (2010). “The Tyranny of Earned income and finance as social innovation”, New Political Economy, 15(1),147-164 https://doi.org/10.1080/13563460903553723
  13. Montgomerie, J., Williams, K. (2009). “Financialised capitalism: After the crisis and beyond neoliberalism” Competition & Change, 13(2), 99-107 https://doi.org/10.1179/102452909X416999
  14. Montgomerie, J. (2009). “The pursuit of (past) happiness? Middle-class indebtedness and American financialisation” New Political Economy14(1),1-24 https://doi.org/10.1080/13563460802671196
  15. Montgomerie, J. (2008). “Bridging the critical divide: global finance, financialisation and contemporary capitalism”, Contemporary Politics, (14) 3, 233-252 https://doi.org/10.1080/13569770802396303
  16. Montgomerie, J. (2006). “The financialization of the American credit card industry.” Competition & Change, 10(3), 301-319. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1449-4035(06)70085-6
  17. Montgomerie, J. (2006). “Giving credit where it’s due: Public policy and household debt in the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada”, Policy and Society, 25(3),109-141. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1449-4035(06)70085-6

Non-Refereed Publications

  1. Cain, R. and Montgomerie, J.* (2019). “Zombie Economy and the Aesthetic of Austerity” Angles – French Perspectives on the Anglophone World 8(01), 582-600 https://doi.org/10.4000/angles.582
  2. Bourne, C., Gilbert, P., Haiven, M. and Montgomerie, J.*** (2018) Colonial debts, imperial insolvencies, extractive nostalgias, with Clea Bourne, Paul Gilbert, Max Haiven, in Discover Society 4
  3. Montgomerie, J. (2018) Understanding and addressing the UK’s private debt crisis, Progressive Economics Group (PEG) Briefing Papers
  4. Montgomerie, J. (2009) “A bailout for working families?“ RENEWAL-Journal of Social Democracy 17.3: 22-32.

Working Papers (referee)

  1. Montgomerie, J.*, Deville, J., and Tischer, D. (2014). Digital Technologies of Debt Resilience: Working Papers of the Communities & Culture Network+ 4.
  2. Montgomerie, J. (2011). ‘The Age of Insecurity: Indebtedness and the Politics of Abandonment’. CRESC Working Paper Series, WP 75
  3. Montgomerie, J.**, and Young, B. (2010). ‘Home Is Where the Hardship Is. Gender and Wealth (Dis) Accumulation in the Subprime Boom’. CRESC Working Paper. WP 64
  4. Montgomerie, J. (2008). ‘(Re) Politicizing Inflation Policy: A Global Political Economy Perspective’. CRESC Working Paper Series. WP 56
  5. Montgomerie, J.**, Leaver, A. and Nilsson, A. (2007). ‘Losing the Battles but Winning the War: The Case of UK Private Equity Industry and Mediated Scandal of Summer’. CRESC Working Paper Series., WP 41

Research Reports

  1. Montgomerie, J., Packman, C., and Tischer, D. (2015). Gaining interest: A new deal for sustained credit union expansion in the UK. Political Economy Research Centre, University of London
  2. Deville, J., Montgomerie, J., Stanley, L., and Packman, C.(2014)The Politics of Indebtedness: A Public Interest Report (2014) Political Economy Research Centre, University of London

Books

  1. McCartney, H., Montgomerie, J. & Tepe, D. (2022) COVID-19 and the fault lines of inequality, London: Palgrave
  2. Montgomerie, J. (2019) Should We Abolish Household Debts? London: Polity Press
  3. Montgomerie, J.*, Davies, W., & Wallin, S. (2015). Financial Melancholia: Mental Health and Indebtedness, London: Goldsmiths Press

Edited Volumes

  1. Gilbert, P., Bourne, C. Haiven, M. Montgomerie, J.** editors(2023).The Entangled Legacies of Empire: Race, Finance & Inequality, Manchester: Manchester University Press
  2. Montgomerie, J. (2017). Critical Methods in Political and Cultural Economy, London: Routledge RIPE series
  3. Montgomerie, J. (2015). Forging Economic Discovery in 21st Century Britain, London: Goldsmiths Press

Chapters in Books

  1. Montgomerie, J. (2022). “Debt relief can finance prosperity – making the case for reducing the repayment burden on households” in Christopher Harker and Amy Horton (ed)Financing Prosperity by Dealing with Debts (London: UCL Press Open Access)
  2. Montgomerie, J. (2021). “Overleveraged Households need debt relief” in Allen, Konzelmann, Toporowski (eds)The Return of the State: Restructuring Britain for the Common Good (Bristol: Agenda).
  3. Montgomerie, J. (2020). “Relief from Austerity: the case for a targeted write-off of the UK’s household debt stock” in Jodi Gardner, Katharina Möser and Mia Gray (eds) Debt and Austerity (London: Edward Elgar)
  4. Montgomerie, J. 2020. “Indebtedness and financialization in everyday life.” in The Routledge international handbook of financialization. (London: Routledge), 380-389.
  5. Montgomerie, J.* and Tepe, D. (2020). “Financialisation, crisis and austerity as the distribution of harm” in The Routledge Handbook of Critical European Studies (London: Palgrave), pg 201-211
  6. Harker, C. and Montgomerie, J.* 2020. “Household Finance” with Chris Harker Routledge Handbook of Financial Geography (London: Routledge), edited by Knox-Hayes, L. and Wójcik, D.
  7. Montgomerie, J. (2019). “Financialisation of Consumer Culture” in International Handbook of Financialization (London: Routledge), edited by Phil Mader, Natasha van der Zwan, Daniel Mertens
  8. Montgomerie, J. (2019). “Resisting the Zombie Economy: Finding the Right Metaphor for Crisis” in Simon Dawes and Marc Lenormand (editors), Neoliberalism in Context: Governance, Subjectivity and Knowledge, (London: Routledge)
  9. Montgomerie, J. (2019). “Curbing the Debt Economy” in New Thinking for the British Economy, edited by Laurie Macfarlane, Open Democracy Collaborative
  10. Montgomerie, J. (2018). “Debt Dependence and the financialization of everyday life”, in Economics for the Many, edited by John McDonnell (MP, Labour), London: Verso
  11. Montgomerie, J. (2018). “Britain’s Private Debt Crisis” Chapter in Himmelweit, S., Konzelmann, S., Smith, J. and Weeks, J. (eds). Social & Economic Policies for a Progressive Government: A Citizen’s Guide (Bristol University Press)
  12. Montgomerie, J. (2016). “Broken Britain: Post-crisis austerity and the trouble with the troubled families programme.” with Daniela Tepe-Belfrage, in Scandalous economics: Gender and the politics of financial crises, edited by A Hoziac and J True, (Oxford: Oxford University Press): 79-91.
  13. Montgomerie, J. (2010). ‘Neoliberalism and the Making of Subprime Borrowers’. Chapter in Konings, M. (editor) The Great Credit Crash.(London: Verso) 103–18.
  14. Montgomerie, J. (2007). ‘The Logic of Neo-Liberalism and the Political Economy of Consumer Debt-Led Growth’. Chapter in McBride, S., and  Lee, S., (editors), Neo-Liberalism, State Power and Global Governance, (Cheltenham: Springer International Publishing) 157–72.
  15. Montgomerie, J. (2006). ‘The Alchemy of Banks’. Chapter in, Assassi, A., Nesvetailova, A., Wigan, (editors) After De-Regulation: Finance in the 21st Century, (London: Palgrave Macmillan)

Artistic Works, Performances, Designs

  1. Podcasts: Montgomerie J. Creator/Contributor. “Inequality the Issue of Our Time” Podcast three part mini-series presented by Kings College London. 2022 February 3.
  2. Montgomerie J. Creator/Contributor. “Financial Recovery from COVID-19“ Podcast presented by King’s College     London. 2020 October 29.
  3. Montgomerie J. Creator/Contributor. “Should we abolish household debt?” Podcast presented by King’s College     London. 2020 November 22.
Presentations
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Presentations

Keynote

“Contemporary Debt politics: policy responses and organized resistance” Keynote address at The Public Cost of Personal Hardship, Cambridge Endowment for Research in Finance annual workshop, St Catherine’s College, University of Cambridge, April 24-25, 2023

“What can Covid19 teach us about inequality? taking a feminist perspective on the household’ Keynote address at Cambridge Journal of Economics 2021 Conference, Newham College, Cambridge, (7-9 September, 2021)

“Forming a Global Progressive Agenda: A Vision of Economic Democracy” Keynote address at Mapping the Global Dimensions of Policy 10: Building Beyond Uncertainty hosted by McMaster University’s Department of Political Science (March 12, 2021)

‘Writing Down High Cost Debt to Combat Inequality’, Keynote address atCentre for Research in Social Science and Humanities (CRASSH) annual conference: High Cost Credit in the Age of Austerity, University of Cambridge (May 8-9, 2019)

‘Debt Relief: past and present’ Keynote address at the Digital/Debt/Empire Symposium, convened by Benjamin Anderson, Enda Brophy and Max Haiven, Simon Fraser University, April 26 and 27, 2019

“Debt and Austerity” – Plenary Speaker at ReThinking Economics Annual Conference: Rethinking Economics in a Post-truth World, Goldsmiths, University of London, (July 1, 2017)

“Why Debts Matter: how interdisciplinarity helps us rethink economics” at International Initiative for the Promotion of Political Economy (iippe) Annual Conference: Rethinking Economics: Pluralism, Interdisciplinarity and Activism, Leeds University Business School, University of Leeds (Sept 10-12, 2015)

International Presentations

“Opening the black-box of the household’ invited address for the session on Macroeconomic Institutions at the Rebuilding Macroeconomics Annual Conference, Edinburgh, Scotland (September, 2019)

“Writing-Down High-Cost Debt to Combat Debt-Based Inequality” invited address at the Centre for Research in Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities (CRASSH) Annual Conference: Debt and the Corona-Crisis – Implications of the Covid-19 Pandemic, St John’s College, University of Cambridge, (June 28-30, 2022)

“What about private debt? Why Greek public debt levels should not be the only concern!” at the Debt Action Greece summit, Numismatic Museum, Athens, Greece, May 16-17, 2015

“From Good Credit to Bad Debts: evaluating what debt does to the household economy” presentation at the International Conference on Microfinance, Bordeaux, France, October 28-29, 2015

“Are Households Financialized?” invited talk at the International Institute for Social Studies, The Hague, NL (July 9-11, 2013)

“Are households in financial crisis?” invited seminar at University of Copenhagen, Methodologies of the Everyday in IPE (May 29-30, 2012)

What is the ‘next’ financial crisis?, invited seminar at University of Lund, Sweden, (September 26, 2011)

“In Debt to Get Ahead: Young Adults and the Financialization of Everyday Life” invited keynote at the Berlin Roundtable on Transnational Crises, jointly organized by Irmgard Coninx Foundation, the Social Science Research Center Berlin (WZB) and the Humboldt-University Berlin, (June 25-29, 2011)

National Participation and Audience

“Contemporary political economy” invited contribution Debt Symposium, Lincoln College, University of Oxford (June 6-7, 2023)

“Crafting a Methodology of the Household for Macroeconomic Policymaking” Funding award address at Macroeconomic Institutions Hub Workshop, National Institute for Economic and Social Research (NIESR), London (14 January, 2021)

“Is it Time to Cancel Houshold Debt?” Invited address to event hosted by the Department of Law, London School of Economics, London (October 15, 2020)

‘The new fault-lines of inequality’ invited presentation at Political Studies Association (PSA) – Sheffield Political Economy Research Institute (SPERI) Workshop: Rethinking Economic Policy: Crisis, Change and Continuity in the UK and Beyond (Zoom meeting: November 25-26, 2021)

 “The Debt Economy in the Age of Austerity​” invited talk to Exploring Economics Group within civil service for Unpacking Economics: Does credit make the 99% Worse Off?​ OfGem, London, (September 20, 2017)

“Should We Abolish Household Debts?” invited speaker the Development Economics Seminar Series, SOAS, University of London (Nov 13, 2017)

“Should We Abolish Household Debts?” Centre for the Study of Social and Global Justice, University of Nottingham, (Feb 22, 2017)

‘Narrative the search for the household economy’ invited presentation for the Global Political Economy Seminar Series, University of Manchester, (Feb 27, 2016)

“The debt safety-net: homeownership and failures of asset-based welfare in the UK” keynote address at Debt: Cultural, Moral and Political Economic Dimensions, hosted by the Cultural Political Economy Research Centre, Lancaster University, (July 12, 2013)

“Debt homeownership and asset-based welfare” invited talk at the Sheffield Political Economy Research Institute annual conference (July 16-19, 2012)

Community Engagement and Social Justice

“A Progressive Recovery” invited panelis with Rachel Reeves MP, Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham, at Labour Party Conference FRINGE in Brighton, UK (September 28, 2021)

“The need for Relief” invited speaker at Roundtable on Household Debt and Covid-19, House of Lords committee on Covid-19 relief, hosted by Bishop of Durham (27 January, 2021)

“A sense of fairness for all in criminal justice, migrant rights and debt” invited speaker at Resetting the Political Economy Conference hosted online by Claim the Future (October 31, 2020)

“Why Household Debts Matter – building a balanced and sustainable economy” invited plenary speaker at Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell’s New Economics Lectures series, Norwich, (March 10th, 2016)

“What are the priorities for future action?” plenary talk with Stella Crassey MP at the annual Centre for Responsible Credit (CfRC) conference, Birmingham (March 31, 2015)

Teaching
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Teaching

My teaching philosophy involves applying institutionalist and feminist theory to establish connections between our daily experiences of the ‘economy’ and the fundamental structures shaping global society. Through the lens of the household, or home economics, so my students explore the significance of money as a social form and accounting as a social technology. Informed by bell hooks’ holistic pedagogy and ‘teaching to transgress,’ I empower students to navigate the intricacies of money, debt, and inequality, fostering the skills to challenge systemic barriers related to gender, race, class, disability, and other forms of disadvantage.

My passion for fostering inclusivity spans over 15 years of educational leadership in the US university system. I’ve developed a toolkit promoting inclusivity in terms of gender, race, class, and indigenous perspectives. My expertise in equity and inclusion in curriculum design transforms university-level curriculum in home economics and political economy of everyday life. Curriculum building and teaching practices incorporate the ‘big ideas’ related to the system, community, and the embodied person, supported by real-life examples.

As an avid educator in research design and dissertations, I foster applied learning environments. In modules covering the philosophy of science, epistemology, ethics, and methods, I employ active learning games, debates, and skits to encourage students to explore both metaphysical and practical questions. Writing becomes an integral part of learning and reflexive practices, providing students with a means to grasp the fundamentals of research—the research question animates the methods used, and a good research question addresses the puzzles, problems, and debates it seeks to explore. Teaching research methodologies is especially rewarding as students enhance their academic research and writing skills.

At UBC I will be teaching in the Masters’ program in Arts, Education, Human Ecology and Everyday Life (HEEL). I’m particularly interested in students seeking MA or PhD-level studies in home economics, political economy of everyday life, money and debt management, financial literacy, the household, feminist or critical pedagogy, curriculum reform in economics, money, and finance.

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