Monbiot on economics

British environmental blogger George Monbiot, has been writing about the economics of Tim Jackson, author of Prosperity without Growth.

This kind of economics was a major focus for my PhD studies. Jackson takes the ecological economics of Herman Daly and Georgescu-Roegen and the members of ISEE to the next step, intellectually speaking.

Unfortunately, and fortunately, nothing very much will happen as a result of Professor Jackson's book or George Monbiot's editorial plug for Professor Jackson's book.

Unfortunately, because without a new economics, we are headed for some very difficult years on planet earth, as the planet's various climate zones shift around, and as our short experiment with fossil-fueled human population and economic growth comes to an end, one way or another.

Fortunately, because untold human misery unfolds every time some academic "scribbler" comes up with a new economic game plan.

Keynes will probably always have the best line on this problem:

"The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back. I am sure that the power of vested interests is vastly exaggerated compared with the gradual encroachment of ideas. "

In particular, in today's America, a vast and unpredictable movement of economic conservatism, of which the so-called Tea Party is just the tip of the iceberg, will refuse to participate in any transition to Jackson's kind of economics. It's possible that some portion of this movement might even become violent, were some other group in society to gain political power and attempt to impose a (new) Jacksonian policy.

Monbiot doesn't talk about this, but I tend to think it an important point.

We're a long, long way from any kind of serious implementation of these kinds of ideas. But it would be good to talk about them.

Preferably without revolutionary or counter-revolutionary violence.