Jessica
Gordon-Nembhard
- Ph.D. and an M.A. in economics from the University of Massachusetts,
Amherst (1992 and 1989, respectively)
- B.A. degree, magna cum laude, in Literature and African American Studies
from Yale University (1978);
- M.A.T. in Elementary Curriculum and Teaching from
Howard University (1982)
Author of Collective Courage: A History of African American Cooperative Economic Thought and Practice (Pennsylvania State University Press 2014 and 2024), and 2016 inductee into the U.S. Cooperative Hall of Fame, Jessica Gordon-Nembhard, Ph.D., is Professor of Community Justice and Social Economic Development, in the Department of Africana Studies, at John Jay CUNY. She’s also the Director of John Jay's McNair Post-Baccalaureate Achievement Program; former Chair of the Department of Africana Studies; former chair of the Malcolm/King Student Leadership Committee; and inaugural Chair of the John Jay Faculty Senate Committee on Racial Justice and Inclusion. Professor Gordon-Nembhard is an affiliate faculty member for John Jay’s Economics Masters Program; and for the Environmental Psychology Ph.D. Program (in the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences), CUNY Graduate Center. She teaches courses such as Institutional Racism, Community-based Approaches to Justice, Introduction to Africana Studies; African American Journeys; African American Studies Research Methods; and Community Economic Development.
Professor Gordon-Nembhard is an internationally recognized political economist specializing in community economic development, solidarity economics, cooperative economics, Black Political Economy, racial wealth inequality, community-based approaches to justice, and popular economic literacy. She is the author of two single-authored books with academic publishers, has a contract for a third book, and is co-editor of six other volumes, in addition to 20 articles in peer-reviewed journals, 26 book chapters; and numerous other publications and public scholarship. She is published in national and international academic journals including: the Review of Black Political Economy, Review of Radical Political Economics, the International Review of Applied Economics, The American Economic Review, Review of International Cooperation, Journal of African American History, and Rethinking Marxism. In addition to authoring the recently reprinted Collective Courage (2024), Jessica Gordon-Nembhard is also co-editor with Ngina Chiteji of Wealth Accumulation and Communities of Color (University of Michigan Press 2006); and author of “Black Political Economy, Solidarity Economics, and Liberation: Toward an Economy of Caring and Abundance” (Review of Radical Political Economics 2023); “Ecosystem Supports for Incarcerated Worker Co-ops” (International Review of Applied Economics 2024 with Esther West); “Community Asset Building and Community Wealth” (Review of Black Political Economy 2014); and “African American Cooperatives and Sabotage: The Case for Reparations” (Journal of African American History 2018); for example.
Professor Gordon-Nembhard is also a Faculty Fellow and Mentor with the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing at Rutgers University School of Management and Labor Relations; an affiliate scholar with the Centre for the Study of Co-operatives, University of Saskatchewan (Canada); an adjunct professor in the Masters program of the International Centre for Co-operative Management, Sobey School of Business, St. Mary’s University, Halifax, NS (Canada). She’s a former affiliate faculty with the Institute for the Cooperative Digital Economy at The New School University’s Platform Cooperativism Consortium; a former Affiliate Policy Scholar at Howard University’s Center on Race and Wealth, in the Economics Department; and former Senior Urban Fellow at the Annenberg Institute for School Reform, Brown University. Dr. Gordon-Nembhard sits on numerous boards of directors of research centers and nonprofits.
Jessica Gordon-Nembhard earned M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in Economics from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst; an M.A.T. in Elementary Curriculum and Teaching from Howard University; and a B.A. degree (double major in Literature and African American Studies with distinction) from Yale University. She is the proud mother of Susan and Stephen, and the grandmother of Stephon, Hugo, Ismaél and Gisèle Nembhard.
Dr. Gordon-Nembhard is the recipient of the Association for Social Economics’ 2023 Thomas F. Divine Award for lifetime contributions to social economics. She was awarded the 2022 Distinguished Faculty Award from the John Jay Alumni Association. Also, in 2022, the Association of Co-operative Educators named their award for Outstanding Contribution to Co-operative Education and Training, The Jessica Gordon Nembhard Award for Outstanding Contribution to Co-operative Education and Training; after awarding it to her in 2021. In 2017 the Canadian Association for Studies in Co-operation recognized her with the CASC Merit Award for exemplary contributions to the field of co-operative studies.
Dr. Gordon-Nembhard was honored with the 2024 Malcolm/King Social Justice Award, by the John Jay Malcolm X/Martin Luther King, Jr. Student Leadership Awards Committee and Program. In 2023, she was awarded the “Outstanding Contributions to Black Cooperative and Solidarity Endeavors” Award from the Network for Developing Conscious Communities, at the 2nd National Black Co-op Agenda Conference, Las Vegas. She was invited to and delivered the 25th Annual David Gordon Memorial Lecture, for the Union of Radical Political Economists at the ASSA 2023 Annual Meetings of the American Economic Association, in New Orleans. During academic year 2022-23, Dr. Gordon-Nembhard was the Selected Scholar for the 2022-23 Social Justice Debates; and Chair of the Final Round of the 2023 Social Justice Debates National Championships February 10-12, 2023, at Morehouse College, Atlanta, GA (the intercollegiate debate series sponsored by Morehouse College and George Washington University, topic was: “To create a more equitable economy in the United States, a worker cooperative model should be broadly adopted.”). She also earned the 2019 African Diaspora Celebration Citation for contributions to the NYC African Diaspora community (from Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams and the New York City Commission on Human Rights); the 2015 “ONI Award” from the International Black Women’s Congress (to an “unsung heroine” who “protects, defends and enhances the general well-being of African people”); and the Cooperative Advocacy and Research Award, from the Eastern Conference for Workplace Democracy in 2011.
Dr. Gordon-Nembhard is currently a member of the Cooperative Economics Council (formerly the Council of Cooperative Economists) of the National Cooperative Business Association/CLUSA; and a member of the International Co-operative Alliance Committee on Co-operative Research. She is a member of the board of directors of: Grassroots Economic Organizing Newsletter/Ecological Democracy Institute of North America, Organizing Neighborhood Equity DC, The Association for Social Economics, Food First, and The CEJJES Institute. She is also an outgoing director on the board of Green Worker Cooperatives; and a former board member of the Association of Cooperative Educators; the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst; and a past President and former Treasurer of the National Economic Association. She recently completed a term as a Senior Advisor for the Equitable Enterprise project, Institute for the Future.
AFR 227 Community-Based Approaches in to Justice
AFR 237 Institutional Racism
AFR 140 Introduction to Africana Studies
AFR 239 African American Journeys
AFR 221 Africana Communities
ECO 740 Community Economic Development
American Economic Association
National Economic Association
The Association for Social Economics
Association for the Study of African American Life and History
Association of Cooperative Educators
Canadian Association for Studies in Co-operation
International Cooperative Alliance Committee on Co-operative Research
Books authored (peer reviewed)
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2024. Collective Courage: A History of African American Cooperative Economic Thought and Practice (Tenth Anniversary Edition). With new “Preface.” University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. Collective Courage: A History of African American Cooperative Economic Thought and Practice. State College, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, May 2014.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. Capital Control, Financial Regulation, and Industrial Policy in South Korea and Brazil. Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, 1996.
Recent Articles in peer-reviewed academic journals
Gordon-Nembhard, Jessica. 2025. “Finding Joy in Ethical Economic Activity.” Rethinking Marxism. Vol. 37. https://doi.org/10.1080/08935696.2025.2516341 .
Gordon-Nembhard, Jessica, & West, Esther. 2024. “Ecosystem supports for incarcerated worker co-ops.” International Review of Applied Economics, 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1080/02692171.2024.2433448
Gordon-Nembhard, Jessica. 2023. “Black Political Economy, Solidarity Economics, and Liberation: Toward an Economy of Caring and Abundance.” 25th Memorial Lecture in honor of David Gordon. Review of Radical Political Economics. Online First March 30, 2023.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2020. “Understanding Why Capitalism Is Not Always Transcended: A Review.” Rethinking Marxism Vol 32 No. 1:118-124. DOI: 10.1080/08935696.2019.1694290
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2018. “African American Cooperatives and Sabotage: The Case for Reparations.” The Journal of African American History Vol. 103 No. 1-2 (Winter/Spring): 65-90.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2017. “Black Women, Cooperatives, and Community.” The Journal of Design Strategies Special Issue “Cooperative Cities,” Vol. 9, No. 1 (Fall), pp. 18-32.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2014. "Community-based Asset Building and Community Wealth." Review of Black Political Economy 41, pp. 101-117.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2013. “Community Development Credit Unions: Securing and Protecting Assets in Black Communities.” Review of Black Political Economy 40, pp. 459-490.
Recent Chapters in peer reviewed books
Gordon-Nembhard, Jessica. 2025. “Worker Co-ops in the United States of America,” Chapter 29 in Bruno Roelants, ed., Cooperativism at Work: Worker-Owned Cooperatives Across the World. Uralungal Labor Contract Cooperative Society (ULCCS). Routledge.
Sutton, Stacey, and Jessica Gordon Nembhard. 2022. “The Promise of African American Worker Cooperatives.” In Serie McDougal, ed., The Discipline and the African World Report 2022, pp. 28-39. An Annual Report on the State of Affairs for Africana Communities, the National Council of Black Studies. https://ncbsonline.org/publications/the-ncbs-annual-report/
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2021. “Building a Cooperative Solidarity Commonwealth.” In The New Systems Reader: Alternatives to a Failed Economy, edited by James Gustave Speth and Kathleen Courrier, pp. 273-284(Chapter 18). New York, NY: Routledge.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica, E. Wyatt Gordon, and Stephen M. Nembhard. 2018. “Engaging African American Youth in Social Change and Community Building through Cooperative Economic Development.” Chapter 10 in Strengthening Families, Communities and Schools to Support Children’s Development: Neighborhoods of Promise, edited by Edmund W. Gordon, Betina Jean-Louis, and Nkechi Obiora, pp. 159-172, New York: Routledge.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2017. “African American Consumer Co-operation: History and Global Connections.” Chapter 8 in A Global History of Consumer Co-operation Since 1850: Movements and Businesses, edited by Mary Hilson, Silke Neunsinger, and Greg Patmore, 176-200. Leiden, The Netherlands: Koninklijke Brill NV (Studies in Global Social History series).
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2015. "Understanding and Measuring the Benefits and Impacts of Co-operatives." In L. Brown, et al (eds). Co-operatives for Sustainable Communities: Tools to Measure Co-operative Impact and Performance, pp. 152-179. Co-operatives and Mutuals Canada and Centre for the Study of Co-operatives (University of Saskatchewan). Altona, MB: Friesens.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica and Lou Hammond Ketilson. 2015. "Identifying the Appropriate Indicators to Measure the Impact of Credit Unions and Other Co-operatives on Their Communities." In L. Brown, et al (eds). Co-operatives for Sustainable Communities: Tools to Measure Co-operative Impact and Performance, pp. 180-204. Co-operatives and Mutuals Canada and Centre for the Study of Co-operatives (University of Saskatchewan). Altona, MB: Friesens.
Gordon Nembhard, J., Hammond Ketilson, L., & Thomas, P. (2014). Measuring the Impact of Credit Unions on Wealth Building in Communities: Identifying the Appropriate Indicators. In L. Hammond Ketilson & M.-P. Robichaud Villettaz (under the direction of), Cooperatives' Power to Innovate: Texts Selected from the International Call for Papers (p. 477-501). Lévis: International Summit of Cooperatives.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2011. “Micro Enterprise and Cooperative Development in Economically Marginalized Communities in the U.S.” In Enterprise, Social Exclusion and Sustainable Communities: The Role of Small Business in Addressing Social and Economic Inequalities, edited by Alan Southern. Routledge.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2008. “Educating Black Youth for Economic Empowerment: Democratic Economic Participation and School Reform Practices and Policies.” In Handbook of African American Education, edited by Linda Tillman, pp. 481-498. Sage Publications.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica. 2008. “Theorizing and Practicing Democratic Community Economics: Engaged Scholarship, Economic Justice, and the Academy.” In Engaging Contradictions: Theory, Politics and Methods of Activist Scholarship, edited by Charles R. Hale, pp. 265-297. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Books/Volumes Edited/Co-edited
Brown, L., C. Carini, J. Gordon Nembhard, L. Hammond Ketilson, E. Hicks, J. MacNamara, S. Novkovic, D. Rixon, and R. Simmons (eds). 2015. Co-operatives for Sustainable Communities: Tools to Measure Co-operative Impact and Performance. Co-operatives and Mutuals Canada and Centre for the Study of Co-operatives (University of Saskatchewan). Altona, MB: Friesens. https://ccr.ica.coop/sites/default/files/2021-11/CoopsforSustainableCommunities1_0.pdf
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica, and Mathew Forstater, guest editors. 2008. “Special Issue: Black Political Economy In The 21st Century: Exploring the Interface of Economics and Black Studies.” Journal of Black Studies Vol. 38 No. 5 (May 2008). Including: Jessica Gordon Nembhard, and Mathew Forstater. “Introduction,” pp. 687-691.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica, and Ngina Chiteji (eds). 2006. Wealth Accumulation in Communities of Color in the U.S.A.: Current Issues. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press. Including: Jessica Gordon Nembhard and Ngina Chiteji. “Introduction,” pp. 1-19.
Feldman, Jonathan Michael and Jessica Gordon Nembhard (eds.). 2002. From Community Economic Development and Ethnic Entrepreneurship to Economic Democracy: The Cooperative Alternative. Partnership for Multiethnic Inclusion, Norrkoping, Sweden (National Institute for Working Life). Including: Jonathan Michael Feldman and Jessica Gordon Nembhard. “Introduction: The Limits of Existing Community Development Theory and Practice,” pp. 1-23. Feldman and Gordon Nembhard (moderators). “A Discussion about the Requirements of a New Approach to Democratic Community Development by Scholars in the United States and Europe,” Chapter 2, pp. 25-55; “Political, Educational and other Constraints on Democratic Economic Transformation: A Discussion of some Basic Issues in the United States,” Chapter 9, pp. 203-212.
Gordon Nembhard, Jessica, guest editor; Anthony Blasingame, assistant editor. 2002. “Special Issue: Tribute to Rhonda M. Williams.” Review of Black Political Economy Vol. 29, No.4 (Spring 2002). Including: Jessica Gordon Nembhard. “Introduction: Tribute to Rhonda M. Williams,” and (bibliography of) “Complete Works” pp. 15-24.
Epstein, Gerald, Julie Graham, and Jessica Nembhard (eds.). 1993. Creating a New WorldEconomy: Forces of Change and Plans for Action. Philadelphia: Temple University Press (for the Center for Popular Economics). Including: Gerald Epstein, Julie Graham, Jessica Nembhard. “Introduction,” pp. 1-16.
2020-Present Faculty Fellow and Mentor with the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing at Rutgers University School of Management and Labor Relations. Kendeda Fellow July 2021 – June 2022.
6/23/2021 2021 ACE Award for Outstanding Contribution to Co-operative Education and Training, Association of Co-operative Educators. In 2022 the award was renamed by ACE as the Jessica Gordon Nembhard Award for Outstanding Contribution to Co-operative Education and Training.
10/27/2022 2022 Distinguished Faculty Award, John Jay Alumni Association. John Jay College, CUNY.
2023 Thomas F. Divine Award for lifetime contributions to social economics and the social economy, The Association for Social Economics. (https://socialeconomics.org/awards-grants/thomas-f-divine-award/ )
9/2023-5/2024 Affiliate faculty, Institute for the Cooperative Digital Economy, The New School University Platform Cooperativism Consortium.
11-10-2023 Academic Award, Black Estate Planning Professionals, Washington, DC 20012
Jessica Gordon-Nembhard is an award willing, internationally recognized political economist who specializes in African American cooperatives, worker cooperatives and workplace democracy, cooperatives as a community economic development strategy, youth-owned cooperatives, and cooperatives owned by incarcerated and previously incarcerated people. She has written extensively about the history of African/Black American cooperatives and the Black co-op movement, as well as the benefits of cooperative enterprises to their members and communities. She has also conducted research on and published about racial wealth inequality and wealth accumulation among communities of color; community-based asset building and community wealth. Additional research interests include community-based approaches to justice, and connections between economic democracy and public safety.