Marking the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther's challenge to the established church, the New Weather Institute and campaign group Rethinking Economics, with input from a wide range of economists, academics and concerned citizens, are challenging the mainstream teaching of economics and publishing the call for a new reformation in 33 Theses for an Economics Reformation.
As the New Weather Institute argues:
Five hundred years ago in Europe, a single belief system dominated all public discourse: Catholic Christianity. Those held to be experts in this set of beliefs held immense power, since it enabled them to claim unique authority in all matters — from the rules of behaviour, to the right to rule. Kings and Queens listened to their advice, and feared their criticism. Intellectuals submitted to the confines of their ideology, as to break free from it took exceptional imagination and courage. Ordinary people may have had misgivings, but the priests protected their theories by speaking in a language that the public could not understand, concealing any contradictory evidence.
There is now a similar situation in Neoclassical economics. It has developed as a belief system does, deriving all its theories from some founding principles which themselves pass unquestioned. It's come to dominate public debate and decision-making; and its proponents claim special authority to pronounce on all matters — from money and savings to migration and sovereignty. Its teaching has taken on the characteristics of indoctrination: students are asked to memorise and repeat rather than to criticise and evaluate. Those who dispute its fundamental theories are ignored or marginalised. Its apparently sophisticated mathematical language presents to the public a veneer of expertise, while obscuring value judgements, guesswork and uncertainty which is, at times, as unworldly as any belief system based on faith.
Five hundred years ago, Martin Luther broke the grip of the monopolistic belief system of his time, with '95 theses' setting out its faults clearly in the common language, making them plain for all to see, and proposing the beginnings of a new way forward. We propose a new 33 Theses for an Economics Reformation.
I was not an author of these demands. I gather Mariana Mazzucato, Victoria Chick, Steve Keen, Larry Elliott and Kate Raworth were. That's a powerful grouping and I have almost no argument with what they have written, barring the fact that there is no explicit reference to the role of tax in economics in the demands made, and that is a mistake in my view.
I am, however, more than happy to endorse these Theses and recommend them.
I did a more tax orientated variation on the theme, with 45 Theses, here.
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We had an economic reformation at the time under King Henry VIII who transferred the wealth and social provision of the Church to public sector spending . Many of the big spenders lost their heads when it began to go badly wrong. But times change. We have had a few other economic reformations since Then some people come along and change the basis of technology and trade and here we go again.
I prefer your 45 Theses.
Thank you
Can we distill such lists to less than 10 points?
I quite like how the NWI list starts:
1. No economic goal can be separated from politics.
2. The distribution of wealth and income are fundamental.
But then it starts to make the same points again (3. Economics is not value-free is similar to 1) and goes downhill fast. To say that 16. “people are not perfect” is ridiculous – can we define what perfect is (I know what they mean but there is not need to write it this way). Or 20. “growth is a political choice” is wrong – if anything growth is mainly a result of people fulfilling their desires and dreams. We have argued here that obsessing about GDP growth may be wrong, but there is such a thing as sustainable growth which is beneficial to all and the does not harm the planet.
And I agree with you that in the top 5 needs to be a point about money and tax because this is how we implement the rules of the economic game.
May be I will do my own list!
Charles
Let’s work in it….
This could be done better
Richard
I like the idea of ten.
It worked for Moses.
I don’t know many who could actually get all Ten of Moses’ Commandments right and in the right order, but I’m pretty sure I know no one who could reel off the ‘Thirty-Nine Articles’. (And I’d need a crib sheet to know if they were even close)
I don’t know anyone with thirty nine fingers (Except Estas Tonne – and I think that’s an illusion, albeit a clever one. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5woVpVF0Bzs )
Richard, “….barring the fact that there is no explicit reference to the role of tax in economics …”
I’m trying. Perhaps not hard enough, but as I said my influence is puny.
PS.
Richard if you are feeling somewhat sidelined by the failure of any recognition of tax in the economic mix think how I feel.
Turnips don’t get a mention. Not once.
Larry Elliott in today’s Guardian is very thought provoking:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/dec/14/governments-control-capitalism-class-war-right-undermine-workers
Agreed
I may post about it
” 5. The nature of the economy is that it is a subset of nature, ……”
Really? Disregarding the inept use of the word ‘nature’ to mean two different things in the same sentence…
I wonder if this isn’t arsey versey.
The economy is over-arching. Nature is a subset of the economy. Nature provides the raw materials of the economy. Along with …population.
Natural resources will to a large extent determine the possible range of economic activity in a particular region. That doesn’t make the economy a subset of nature, but rather the contrary I suggest.
It is in part because we see this relationship backwards that we screw the ‘ecology’ by regarding it as a given rather than a means of production to be effectively managed.
If I’m right, (which I think I am, obviously, or I wouldn’t be writing this) points 6-8 are immediately suspect.
I was at the event that Richard described and I suspect that most regular visitors here would have thoroughly enjoyed it. Each of the panel spoke briefly and then it was open to wider discussion with a good mix of people. The conversation then continued for several hours in the pub afterwards
Worth emphasising that this is seen as just a start. The 33 theses had been put together quickly and they would be the first to agree that there could have been more, and also that from a communications point of view there need to be less. There was an element of humour as well as a crowd of us trooped down to LSE to symbolically ‘nail’ the 33 to the main door. Steve Keen came dressed as a monk!
The start point is to challenge the dominance of current neo-classical economics and everything that flows from it, not just in academia. This picks up on the work of the PostCrash Economics folk – if you’ve not read their book Econocracy, put it on your list. Hence their first point being to ask what and who economics and the economy is for.
My sense is that the people behind this have the big-picture, system view of economy, recognising the different components and how they interact. There’s a recognition that to tackle not just today’s challenges but those of the next 10-20 years, requires something very different to the stale, outdated, tactical, short term, sticking plaster offerings that are out there at the moment. From the Left as well as Right. Though this group would be clearly to the Left if you want to pigeon hole them. Over time that means developing implementable policies, engaging political parties and find ways to engage the public by in the development and in the outcomes
I’d strongly encourage people to engage with this initiative – or if there others like it, please let us all know. IPPR have recently published a large paper though I’ve not yet ploughed through it. Makes a change to be trying to do something productive rather than shouting at the radio or ranting on a blog!
Robin
Discussion on the Theses is going on behind the scenes….
Best and thanks
Richard
Apropos no particular thread, but not quite off topic, I would recommend this blogger as a thoughtful source which I think will go down well with some regulars to this site who haven’t discovered him yet.
He posts as Mark GB and I like his stuff.
http://www.markgb.com/blog/2017/12/15/government-vs-the-people