One of the books that I frequently reference is “Elite Capture: How the Powerful Took Over Identity Politics (And Everything Else)" by Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò.

Power thrives by recasting corporate plunder as liberation—a core deception Law and Political Economy (LPE) exposes. In LPE the markets are viewed as legal constructs, and "deregulation" is never neutral: its regulation redesigned to privatize gains and socialize risks onto the working class. Feminist urbanism names this theft and demands infrastructure for life-sustaining work, not corporate speed.

During COVID, I witnessed this at North America’s leading early education organization. Colleagues argued it was "fair" to keep underpaid childcare workers on-site—amidst pandemic deaths—asking, "How else would they pay rent?" This logic was crafted on Zoom by women whose homes relied on nannies and maids.  

When I stated with the least emotion possible, "You’re safely at home," and proposed paying educators to stay home while supporting parents, they rejected it. "They’ll get bored," someone said and floated around an idea of a hashtag instead. This was solidarity perverted by market fundamentalism: treating lives as disposable inputs in a profit machine. When they pressured me—a Black woman—to legitimize this in a national op-ed, I refused and resigned.  

The same regulatory theft now targets cycling.