What is economics? What can - and can't - it explain about the world? Why does it matter?

2015

Level: beginner

Economics: The User's Guide

Ha-Joon Chang

Bloomsbury USA

The 2007-2008 financial crisis exposed the shortcomings of mainstream economic theory with economists unprepared to deal with it. In the face of this, a major rethinking of economics seems necessary and in presenting alternative approaches to economic theory, this book contributes to the rebuilding of the discipline.

2019

Level: advanced

Alternative Approaches to Economic Theory

Víctor A. Beker

Routledge

In its first edition, this book helped to define the emerging field of ecological economics. This new edition surveys the field today. It incorporates all of the latest research findings and grounds economic inquiry in a more robust understanding of human needs and behavior.

2010

Level: beginner

Ecological Economics - Principles and Applications

Herman E. Daly, Joshua Farley

Island Press

This book is an authoritative and accessible guide to the pluralist movement threatening to revolutionise mainstream economics. Leading figures in the field explain why pluralism is a required virtue in economics, how it came to be blocked and what it means for the way we think about, research and teach economics.

2013

Level: advanced

Pluralist Economics

Edward Fullbrook

Zed Books Ltd.

p>Twenty-first-century economists will have to understand and improve a post-Cold War world in which no single economic theory or system holds the key to human betterment. Heterodox economists have much to contribute to this effort, as a wave of pluralism spawns new lines of research and new dialogues among non-mainstream economists.

2008

Level: advanced

Future Directions for Heterodox Economics

John T. Harvey, Robert F. Garnett, Robert F. Garnett, Jr.

University of Michigan Press

This volume is concerned with the different schools within the discipline of economics (theoretical pluralism) and the relationship of economics to other disciplines, such as sociology, political science and philosophy (interdisciplinarity).

2007

Level: advanced

Teaching Pluralism in Economics

John Groenewegen

Edward Elgar

John Harvey's accessible book provides a non-technical yet rigorous introduction to various schools of thought in economics. Premised on the idea that economic thinking has been stunted by the almost complete rejection of anything outside the mainstream, the author hopes that this volume will open readers' minds and lead them in new and productive directions.

2016

Level: advanced

Contending Perspectives in Economics

John T. Harvey

Edward Elgar Publishing

Are humans at their core seekers of their own pleasure or cooperative members of society? Paradoxically, they are both. Pleasure-seeking can take place only within the context of what works within a defined community, and central to any community are the evolved codes and principles guiding appropriate behavior, or morality.

2013

Level: advanced

From Pleasure Machines to Moral Communities

Geoffrey M. Hodgson

University of Chicago Press

Principles of Macroeconomics by Howard J. Sherman and Michael A. Meeropol differs from other texts in that this book stresses far more the inherent instability of the macro-economy.

2013

Level: advanced

Principles of Macroeconomics

Howard J. Sherman, Michael Meeropol

M.E. Sharpe

The third edition of Political Economy: The Contest of Economic Ideas is a fully updated overview of the political economy and its connection with social concerns. This book investigates the main traditions of economic ideas and provides a 'big picture' overview of the analytical tools and value judgements associated with competing schools of economic thought.

2011

Level: advanced

Political Economy

Frank Stilwell

OUP Australia & New Zealand

Economics After the Crisis is an introductory economics textbook, covering key topics in micro and macro economics. However, this book differs from other introductory economics textbooks in the perspective it takes, and it incorporates issues that are presently underserved by existing textbooks on the market. This book offers an introduction to economics that takes into account criticisms of the orthodox approach, and which acknowledges the role that this largely Western approach has played in the current global financial and economic crisis.

2014

Level: advanced

Economics After the Crisis

Irene van Staveren

Routledge

Mainstream economics almost completely ignores the role power plays in determining economic outcomes, which means it can only provide partial explanations of the distribution of wealth and income, and of the problems associated with inequality and poverty.

2016

Level: advanced

Power and Neoclassical Economics

Ozanne, Adam

Palgrave Pivot

This unique up-to-date volume not only provides state-of-the-art discussions of the most recent developments in modern macroeconomics but also includes a series of interviews with leading economists that shed new light on the major intellectual and policy issues of the 1990s. The book is at once an invaluable text and a superb overview that will be welcomed by teachers and students alike.

1994

Level: beginner

A Modern Guide to Macroeconomics

Snowdon, Brian; Vane, Howard R.; Wynarczyk, Peter

Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd

Having dissected what's supposedly wrong with contemporary macroeconomics, Steve Keen, on the leading critics of the mainstream of our times and distinguished economist himself, goes on to present his idea of a New Economics: What premises it should build on, what methods it should use, and yes, what purpose it should serve.

2022

Level: beginner

The New Economics

Steve Keen

Wiley

Orthodox economics operates within a hypothesized world of perfect competition in which perfect consumers and firms act to bring about supposedly optimal outcomes. The discrepancies between this model and the reality it claims to address are then attributed to particular imperfections in reality itself.

2018

Level: advanced

Capitalism

Anwar Shaikh

Oxford University Press

Leigh Phillips and Michal Rozworski examine the apparent contradiction between the demise of real-existing socialism and the rise of large corporations engaging in planning every day, making a strong argument that these planning efforts should be transformed to now fulfil the needs of the people.

2019

Level: advanced

The People's Republic of Walmart

Leigh Phillips; Michal Rozworski

Verso Books