Sunday, July 22, 2012

A Global Political Economy museum in Stockholm?!

During a day of touring in Stockholm, I was looking for a restroom, so I wandered in The Royal Coin Cabinet.  I'm not too interested in coin collecting, but I'm very interested in clean restrooms, so in I went.  Stockholm Card in hand, the museum was free, so, I rationalized, why not take a quick look?

The Royal Coin Cabinet website

Wow!  Was I glad I did!!!!

Shortly into my visit, I came upon this:

Huh?  But wait!  They look familiar!  Here they are closer up:






Colbert (the dead Frenchman, not the live comedian), Smith, Marx, Keynes, and Friedman looking down upon us from the heavens?  (And why doesn't Friedman have wings?  He does have a wristwatch, though.)

The sign to the left of this display apparently gives the soundbite version of GPE theories (Mercantilism, Liberalism, Socialism, Keynsianism, Monetarism):


And if you would like to learn more, the shelf next to this text provides the longer versions:




Specie (exemplified by the really big & heavy copper coin below) and fiat money (the early bank note in the next image), and regional and global monetary regimes were the subject of other exhibits:





Global trade was not left out either.  This wall mural of a lively Swedish dinner records where all the food comes from.



There was more, too.  I neglected to get a picture of the display on the relationship between war and inflation.

The museum was beautifully done, and it struck me that this was an ingenious way to teach visitors about the economy and how money works.  I wish I could bring my GPE students on a field trip.