Economics need to change - now more than ever! With Exploring Economics, we strengthen alternative economic approaches and counter mainstream economics with a critical and pluralistic vision of economic education. We also provide background analyses on current economic debates to strengthen a critical economic discourse.
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Pluralist Economics for a Sustainable Economic Future
Summer Academy 2022 for Pluralist Economics, 2022
This workshop was originally taught at the Summer Academy for Pluralist Economics 2022
Instructor: Sarah Lange (University of Siegen, Germany)
Course Content and Outcome
The workshop deals with the contribution of Plural Economics to the urgently needed change of the economic system towards sustainability and global responsibility.
After completing the module, participants should be able to demarcate and explain different economic approaches to sustainability. They should be able to evaluate the respective concepts based on their contribution to the ecological transformation of the economic system.
Required Texts
All texts used in the course will be sent to the participants by the instructor during the workshop. Therefore, no books need to be purchased or worked on in preparation for the course.
During the workshop, participants will work (among others) with excerpts from the following publications:
- Daly, H. (1999). Steady-state economics. Island.
- Daly, H. & Farley, J. (2004). Ecological economics. Island.
- IPCC (2022). 6. Main report. Climate change 2022: Impacts, adaptation and vulnerability. Working group II. Full report.
- Keohane, N. et al. (2016). Markets and the environment. Island.
- Paech, N. (2012). Liberation from excess: The road to a post-growth economy. Oekom.
- Raworth, K. (2017). Doughnut economics. Radom House Business.
- Reardon, J. et al. (2018). Introducing a new economics. Pluto.
- Sarkar, S. (1999). Eco-socialism or eco-capitalism?. Zed.
- Tietenberg, T. et al. (2019). Environmental economis: The essentials. Taylor & Francis.
German-speaking course participants can (voluntarily) prepare for the guest lecture by looking at Prof. Peukert's current book:
- Peukert, H. (2022). Klimaneutralität jetzt! Update 2022. Metropolis.
Course Schedule
Day 1: “Warm up”
- Getting to know each other
- Presentation of the workshop schedule
- Introduction to the concept and goals of Pluralist Economics
- Why do we need a stronger sustainability discourse in economics - scientific facts on the climate crisis
Day 2: Economic growth with new attributes
- Theories of the economic mainstream and its extensions (environmental economics, eco-innovation, green growth, consumer responsibility)
- Decoupling growth and environmental degradation
- Current state of the European climate policy, especially emissions trading and its criticism (guest lecture by Prof. Dr. Dr. Peukert)
Day 3: Alternative economic concepts outside the logic of growth
- Ecological economics (post-growth economics, steady state economy, ecosocialism)
Day 4: New economic and social orders with a focus on human well-being
- Economy of the common good, solidarity-based economy
Day 5: Critical application and “cool down”
- Evaluation of the various approaches in terms of their contribution to a sustainable economy
- Guiding questions:
- Which economic approaches meet the demands of climate science?
- Combination of several approaches with regard to their sustainability requirements or commitment to certain schools of economic thought?