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This book challenges the mainstream paradigm, based on the inter-temporal optimisation of welfare by individual agents. It introduces a methodology for studying how institutions create flows of income, expenditure and production together with stocks of assets and liabilities, thereby determining how whole economies evolve through time.
2012
Level: advanced
Monetary Economics
Transition from central planning to a market economy, involving large-scale institutional change and reforms at all levels, is often described as the greatest social science experiment in modern times.
2013
Level: advanced
Handbook of the Economics and Political Economy of Transition
This book presents a methodological framework for the analysis of intercultural issues frequently misinterpreted by existing theories. It uses a challenge-and-response theory of cultural development to examine the relationship between different natural disasters and threats and the developments of ancient civilizations.
2012
Level: beginner
Introduction to Intercultural Economics
Readers of economic and political theory as well as students of economic planning will appreciate this classic, now available for the first time in English. Written eighty years ago, when Sorel became disillusioned with the official socialism of the German and French Marxist parties, this new translation presents Sorel's analysis of the rise and fall of the two great modern ideologies: socialism and liberal capitalism.
2017
Level: advanced
Social Foundations of Contemporary Economics
In the pluralist showcase series by Rethinking Economics, Cahal Moran explores non-mainstream ideas in economics and how they are useful for explaining, understanding and predicting things in economics.
2020
Level: beginner
Pluralist Showcase
More Heat Than Light is a history of how physics has drawn some inspiration from economics and also how economics has sought to emulate physics, especially with regard to the theory of value. It traces the development of the energy concept in Western physics and its subsequent effect upon the invention and promulgation of neoclassical economics.
1991
Level: advanced
More Heat Than Light
The first day of the workshop is intended to initiate students to the foundational concepts of ecological economics. Ecological economics is an ecological critique of economics, applying the energetics of life to the study of the economy. It also investigates the social distribution of environmental costs and benefits. It does so by deconstructing concepts that are taken for granted like “nature” or “the economy”, excavating their ideological origins.
2022
Level: beginner
Political ecology, degrowth, and the Green New Deal
This collection of essays, a supplement to History of Political Economy, brings together prominent scholars from economics, sociology, literature, and history to examine the role of biography and autobiography in the history of economics. The first of its kind, this volume looks at the relevance of first-person accounts to narrative histories of economics.
2007
Level: advanced
Economists' Lives
In this lecture Mirowski claims that a good critique of and alternative to neoclassical economics should focus on microeconomics. In addition, he claims that mainstream economics is not about a specific "human nature", instead the understanding of markets (partially based on Hayek) is of special importance. As an alternative Mirowski proposes institutionalist economics that builds upon how markets work nowadays (e.g. links to computer science).
2015
Level: expert
Should Economists be Experts in Markets or in Human Nature?
The first keynote speech was given by Sebastian Dullien, current spokesperson of FMM and who is one of the most well-known German economists in applied European economics and a very active contributor to the pluralist debate. Sebastian discusses the strategy of “running with the pack” by using orthodox methods to disseminate pluralist economics and politics. Referring to diverse examples Sebastian addresses the pros and cons of “running with the pack” and proposes alternative approaches to achieve more pluralism in economics.
2016
Level: beginner
How to promote alternative macroeconomic ideas: Are there limits to running with the (mainstream) pack?
The MINE website explores the interplay between nature and economy. Focusing on such fundamental concepts as time, thermodynamics, evolution, homo politicus and justice, a new outline of economic activity emerges within nature. The dominant approach of Mainstream Economics, which considers nature as a subsystem of the economy, is thus replaced by a broader and more integrated framework. The visual map and its links between concepts provides an orientation. The visitor can approach the content from their own starting point and follow their own path to discovery. Each concept starts with the historical background and moves on through theory and practice. The research behind MINE began in the 1970s at the University of Heidelberg, Germany, in an interdisciplinary group spearheaded by Professor Malte Faber, including scientists from economics to mathematics, physics and philosophy. The research has contributed to the field of Ecological Economics. MINE is directed at students, scientists and decion-makers. More on http://nature-economy.de/faq/
2019
Level: beginner
MINE - Mapping the interplay between Nature and Economy
For many, Thomas Carlyle's put-down of economics as "the dismal science" rings true--especially in the aftermath of the crash of 2008. But Diane Coyle argues that economics today is more soulful than dismal, a more practical and human science than ever before. The Soulful Science describes the remarkable creative renaissance in economics, how economic thinking is being applied to the paradoxes of everyday life.
2009
Level: advanced
The Soulful Science
A review of: [1] Intermediate Microeconomics, H.R. Varian [2] Mikrooekonomie, R.S. Pindyck, D.L. Rubinfeld [3] Grundzuege der mikrooekonomischen Theorie, J. Schumann, U. Meyer, W. Stroebele
2016
Level: beginner
The Dichotomy, Inconsistency, and Peculiar Outmodedness of the "Mainstream" Textbook
In parallel to rising inflation numbers, the concept of profit inflation has clearly risen to prominence in recent years. But what is it exactly? This dossier aims not only to collect the most important publications on profit inflation but also intends to map out the development of the discourse and the different positions within the debate.
2024
Level: advanced
Profit Inflation: Mapping the debate
"Specialise!" is the advice often given by career advisers, school teachers and the like. David Epstein takes the opposite position: In an ever more specialised, highly complex world, it pays to have good old-fashioned broad common knowledge in as many areas as you take interest in, both in terms of intellectual curiosity and professional success. To have a decent grasp of various aspects of life means to be able to discern the links between them, thus developing a better understanding of how our world works and what drives events as they unfold.
2020
Level: beginner
Range
The Revolution in Corporate Finance has established itself as a key text for students of corporate finance with wide use on a range of courses. Using seminal articles from the highly regarded Bank of America Journal of Applied Corporate Finance, it gives students real insight into the practical implications of the most recent theoretical advances in the field.
2003
Level: advanced
The Revolution in Corporate Finance
Caring activities are one central element of feminist economists' analysis – also since in particular unremunerated work is a blind spot in mainstream economics and most other economic paradigms. Those focus on the market sphere: activities are considered as productive and as real labour if they are remunerated and market-intermediated. Goods and services are considered as labour if they create a value which can be traded on the market. Feminist Economics remarks that this perspective creates certain dichotomies and consequent devaluations: unproductive – productive; private – public; unpaid – remunerated OR paid less – well paid; female – male; soft work – hard work; caring – rationality.
2016
Level: beginner
Reproductive Labour and Care
Understanding international trade is central to economics and is currently a hot political issue. It’s an area where popular perceptions of mainstream economics are low, since they have historically missed some important downsides of trade agreements, especially the hollowing out of former manufacturing hubs in the Western world. et economists have for long time had a theory of trade with an impressive amount of scientific clout behind it: the gravity trade model.
2020
Level: beginner
A Theory of Enormous Gravity
The notion that the demand and supply side are independent is a key feature of textbook undergraduate economics and of modern macroeconomic models. Economic output is thought to be constrained by the productive capabilities of the economy - the ‘supply-side' - through technology, demographics and capital investment. In the short run a boost in demand may increase GDP and employment due to frictions such as sticky wages, but over the long-term successive rises in demand without corresponding improvements on the supply side can only create inflation as the economy reaches capacity. In this post I will explore the alternative idea of demand-led growth, where an increase in demand can translate into long-run supply side gains. This theory is most commonly associated with post-Keynesian economics, though it has been increasingly recognised in the mainstream literature.
2020
Level: beginner
It’s Demand All the Way Down
This lecture is based on the “Introducing the Economy” chapter from the Economy Studies book, which introduces the first building block in their framework for transforming the economics education. The aim is to give students a feel and understanding of the economy as part of a bigger whole. Thus, it is aimed to introduce to students before getting into the economics curriculum with theory and models.
2022
Level: beginner
Introducing the Economy
In both economics textbooks and public perceptions central banks are a fact of life. On the wall of my A-level economics classroom there was the Will Rogers quote “there have been three great inventions since the beginning of time: fire, the wheel, and central banking”, summarising how many economists view the institution. There is a widespread belief that there is something different about money which calls for a central authority to manage its operation, a view shared even by staunch free marketeers such as Milton Friedman. This belief is not without justification, since money underpins every transaction in a way that apples do not, but we should always be careful not to take existing institutions for granted and central banking is no exception. In this post I will look at the idea of private or free banking, where banks compete (and cooperate) to issue their own currency.
2020
Level: beginner
Whither Central Banks?
"A serious reconsideration of the 'economics of science' is long overdue," say Philip Mirowski and Esther-Mirjam Sent in the introduction to Science Bought and Sold. Indeed, it is only recently that one could speak of a field of economics of science at all.
2002
Level: advanced
Science Bought and Sold
This innovative book offers targeted strategies for effectively and efficiently teaching economics at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. It provides professors and other teachers of economics various techniques to engage and retain the interest of students, and challenges them to apply both knowledge and methodological tools to a range of economic problems.
2014
Level: advanced
New Developments in Economic Education
This paper is a product of an online workshop held in Nigeria on the topic Unemployment: Policy Review and Recommendations. It explores the various unemployment policies introduced by the Nigerian Government and analysis how effective they are and suggests some practicable solutions to solving unemployment problems in the country. The workshop was organized by Rethinking Economics The Uploaders (RETU) as part of the project Solving the Major Economic Problem in Nigeria (SMEPN), an output of the Global Pluralist Economics Training (GPET). More details here: https://www.retheuploaders.org/programs/SMEPN
2021
Level: beginner
Unemployment in Nigeria: Policy Review and Recommendations
In this talk, Virgil Henry Storr, a Research Associate Professor of Economics in the Department of Economics at George Mason University, talks about his research into to post-disaster recovery and the role that social entrepreneurship plays in rebuilding the communities and social networks that get disrupted, or entirely eliminated.
2017
Level: beginner
Community revival in the wake of disaster: Lessons in local entrepreneurship
The principle of effective demand, and the claim of its validity for a monetary production economy in the short and in the long run, is the core of heterodox macroeconomics, as currently found in all the different strands of post-Keynesian economics (Fundamentalists, Kaleckians, Sraffians, Kaldorians, Institutionalists) and also in some strands of neo-Marxian economics, particularly in the monopoly capitalism and underconsumptionist school In this contribution, we will therefore outline the foundations of the principle of effective demand and its relationship with the respective notion of a capitalist or a monetary production economy in the works of Marx, Kalecki and Keynes. Then we will deal with heterodox short-run macroeconomics and it will provide a simple short-run model which is built on the principle of effective demand, as well as on distribution conflict between different social groups (or classes): rentiers, managers and workers. Finally, we will move to the long run and we will review the integration of the principle of effective demand into heterodox/post-Keynesian approaches towards distribution and growth.
2015
Level: advanced
The principle of effective demand: Marx, Kalecki, Keynes and beyond
In spite of the manifold critique about the state of economics in the aftermath of the financial crisis, an even increasing presence of economists and economic experts can be observed in the public sphere during the last years. On the one hand this reflects the still dominant position of economics in the social sciences as well as the sometimes ignorant attitude of economists towards findings of other social sciences. On the other hand this paper shows that the public debate on politico-economic issues among economists is dominated by a specific subgroup of economists, tightly connected to an institutional network of “German neoliberalism”. This group of “public economists” (i) is dominant in public debates even after the financial crisis, (ii) reproduces the formative German economic imaginary of the Social Market Economy in a German neoliberal interpretation and (iii) has a good access to German economic policymaking, rooted in a long history of economic policy advice.
2016
Level: advanced
Still the queens of social sciences? (Post-)Crisis power balances of “public economists” in Germany
Gender, Development, and Globalization is the leading primer on global feminist economics and development. Lourdes Benería, a pioneer in the field of feminist economics, is joined in this second edition by Gunseli Berik and Maria Floro to update the text to reflect the major theoretical, empirical, and methodological contributions and global developments in the last decade.
2015
Level: advanced
Gender, Development, and Globalization
Want to learn more about behavioural economics and its application to public policy? Take this free course from the Behavioural Economics Team of the Australian Government.
Level: beginner
Behavioural insights for public policy
UBC's Henry Siu, a professor at the Vancouver School of Economics, speaks about innovation in economics, technological progress and what it means for the fut...
2018
Level: beginner
Understanding technological change
In this short talk 'Measuring the Danger of Segregation' Trevon Logan, Professor of Economics at The Ohio State University, explores the impacts of structural racism on economics and health.
2020
Level: advanced
Measuring the Danger of Segregation
Steven G. Medema is a Research Professor at Duke University. His research focuses on the History of Economic Thought, having published extensively on the issue of social costs of production (conceptualized as externalities in neoclassical economics). In this recorded seminar, he exposes his working paper on the history of the concept of externalities in economic literature, starting from Pigou’s “The Economics of Welfare” (1920), where Pigou makes the case for governmental intervention in the market where there is a divergence between private and social costs or benefits of a productive activity. T
2017
Level: advanced
'Exceptional and Unimportant'? The Rise, Fall, and Rebirth of Externalities in Economic Analysis

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