Bringing Economics Down to Earth

I have been a bit lax about posting recently because I am watching a publisher's deadline rush towards me over the horizon. The book is to be called The Bioregional Economy: Land, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. This is all about bringing the economy down to earth and so I'm very pleased to share with you a presentation Mary Mellor gave recently at Schumacher College.

She focused on the distortions within standard economic theory, criticising the unreal nature of neoclassical theory, and explaining why it has resulted in a global economy that is so disembedded, a really useful concept that she uses along with other feminist economists to explain the way finance has come to dominate the real economy. This has parallels with Polanyi's writing about the 'great transformation' from earthbound to market-based economies.

Mary describes the 'destructive transcendence' which uses expropriation and profit to drive a growth-based economy that ignores human needs and devastates the planet. She also describes the nature of money creation and circulation. The whole presentation is a classic view of a gaian approach to economics and I'm proud to link to it from this blog.
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