Daniel Judt

Daniel Judt is a PhD candidate in modern U.S. history, with a focus on social theory and the history of capitalism in the late twentieth century. His dissertation, provisionally titled Past Time: Capitalism and Social Theory in Postindustrial America, explores the oft-lamented ‘end’ or ‘loss’ of futurity that took hold across leftwing intellectual life from the late-1970s through the late-1990s. Working from a framework of Marxian social theory, Past Time argues that these attitudes towards time, loss, and the future can be understood as expressions of the temporal dynamic of late-twentieth century capitalism. The project engages with a number of central themes in the study of the recent past, including neoliberalism, financialization, de-industrialization, and postmodern and post-Marxist thought.

Daniel’s published writing ranges widely across US history, social theory, and contemporary politics. His academic work has been featured in Critical Historical Studies, The American Journal of Legal History, and Southern Cultures; public essays have appeared in the Nation and the Point Magazine, among others. He is currently co-editing a collection of essays on the concept of “dependence” in modern history and social theory, to be published with Verso in 2026.

Daniel received a BA in history from Yale in 2018 and an MPhil in political theory from Oxford in 2020. Prior to beginning his PhD, he worked as a political organizer with UNITE HERE Local 11, a hospitality-workers union in California and Arizona, where he helped to develop workers’ education programs for union members. He remains committed to teaching history and social theory in non-traditional settings.