Economics Unmasked
An inspiring outline of a new economics system, where justice, human dignity, compassion and reverence for life are the guiding values.
The economic system under which we live not only forces the great majority of humankind to live their lives in indignity and poverty but also threatens all forms of life on Earth. Economics Unmasked presents a cogent critique of the dominant economic system, showing that the theoretical constructions of mainstream economics work mainly to bring about injustice.
The merciless onslaught on the global ecosystem of recent decades, brought about by the massive increase in the production of goods and the consequent depletion of nature’s reserves, is not a chance property of the economic system. It is a direct result of neoliberal economic thinking, which recognizes value only in material things. The growth obsession is not a mistaken conception that mainstream economists can unlearn, it is inherent in their view of life. But a socio-economic system based on the growth obsession can never be sustainable.
This book outlines the foundations of a new economics, where we are not ruled by greed and injustice. Contrary to the absurd assumption of mainstream economists that economics is a value-free science, a new economics must make its values explicit.
Philip Bartlett Smith was an American-Dutch experimental physicist and writer who after his retirement devoted himself to studying economic theories, environment and energy, and world poverty. He was co-author of The World at the Crossroads and the editor of Dimensions of Sustainability.
Manfred Max-Neef is a Chilean-German economist and environmentalist. He is Professor of Ecological Economics in the Southern University of Chile, and Director of the Economics Institute. His book Human Scale Development has been recognised by Cambridge University as one of the fifty most important texts in sustainability.