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A Must Read and the Norgaard essay referred to as well. <br>
<br>
All very welcome not least because some decades ago I tried to get
'capitalism as a religion' on the agenda of science and society
media series but the Marxist scholar we were working with dismissed
the notion, 'back to the drawing board' I was told. It shut down
that line of inquiry for a long time.<br>
<br>
I'd offer a caveat re the Noorgard article, he writes as though he
believes we can somehow get outside nature. Might it also be
sacreligious to try to insist that along with us capitalism and all
its artefacts are intrinsicly a part of nature? An essential
perspective I now find personally. But has it perhaps become an
orthodoxy I haven't noticed?<br>
Denis Postle<br>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 16/11/2015 06:40, Michel Bauwens
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote
cite="mid:CAK_2xi+gt6j=+eT5TkkUYDavH2=GDgvePu3TL7PY+m7ENhohnw@mail.gmail.com"
type="cite">
<div dir="ltr"><br>
<div class="gmail_quote">---------- Forwarded message ----------<br>
From: <b class="gmail_sendername">Great Transition Network</b>
<span dir="ltr"><<a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="mailto:gtnetwork@greattransition.org">gtnetwork@greattransition.org</a>></span><br>
Date: Mon, Nov 9, 2015 at 10:22 PM<br>
Subject: The Church of Economism and Its Discontents (GTN
Discussion)<br>
To: <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="mailto:michelsub2004@gmail.com">michelsub2004@gmail.com</a><br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
>From John� Barry <<a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="mailto:j.barry@qub.ac.uk">j.barry@qub.ac.uk</a>><br>
<br>
-------------------------------------------------------<br>
�Economists�the prophets and priests of this new
religion�preach about and have a major impact on public policy
and our institutional arrangements. Economics therefore
provides an alternative faith tradition, complete with values,
ideas of welfare and of progress�usually defined in terms of
quantitative economic indicators, which dominate public
discourse and which seek to reshape our institutions and
organisations. With their influence on government, economists
are the new theocracy, the contemporary manifestation of
Plato�s guardians.... In ancient times, seers entered a trance
and informed anxious seekers of the mood of the gods and
whether the time was auspicious for particular enterprises.
Today, the financial media are the diviners and seers of THE
MARKET�s moods, the high priests of its mysteries. THE MARKET
has become the most formidable rival to traditional religions,
not least because it is rarely recognised as a religion.�
(Boldeman, 2007: 279).<br>
<br>
Norgaard's timely essay follows nicely from some of the
previous essays this year - from Kallis, Daly and Bellamy
Foster for example - in offering another critical perspective
on the ideological dimensions of dominant economic thinking.
While I agree 100% with the analysis offered by Norgaard, I
feel he pulls his punches. Everything he describes as
'economism' can be easily and equally described as 'capitalist
economics' or - to give its more usual nomme de guerre -
neoclassical economics. 'Economism' is, after all, simply the
ideology of capitalist economics, the capitalist economic
imaginary that has now achieved almost full spectrum
ideological and imaginative domination in how we define and
describe the economy and this how we conceptualise
'economics'.<br>
<br>
Thus it is not the �Anthropocene� we now live in (which
conveniently elides and deliberately obscured issues of class,
power, global and national inequality, and injustices between
peoples and places), nor is it the �Ecocene� as Norgaard
suggests. No, rather than either of these terms, a more
accurate description for the current age is the �Capitalocene�
(Moore, 2014). After all, what we witness is not the
'humanisation the world', nor has our planet been
�economised�, but rather the earth has been 'capitalised'. And
it has been capitalised, rendered into commodities, monetised,
and valued right from the micro-level of DNA through
biotechnology to the macro-level of the entire planet becoming
negatively affected through climate change by capitalism and
its addiction fossil fueled endless orthodox economic growth.<br>
<br>
Similarly, when Norgaard talks of 'economists', I do not think
he is talking about feminist economists, ecological
economists, Marxist or heterodox economists, or green
political economists such as myself. No, he is correctly
talking about those who are members of the dominant economic
orthodoxy, capitalist, that is, neoclassical economists, so
let's call a spade a spade. And, of course, it is economics as
doxa that enables it to be interpreted as form of religious
thinking.<br>
<br>
In everything from the nonsense of a 'value-free', objective
'science' of the human economy to myths of endless economic
growth on a finite planet, we can correctly ascertain the
ideological and mythic characteristics of modern
capitalist/neoclassical economics. So I ask if it looks like a
pig, smells and walks like a pig, why not simply state that
what we're talking about is capitalism, its ideological power
and inherent tendencies to ecological irrationality and social
injustice? Why be coy?<br>
<br>
On this issue, I've been always struck with the reticent of
American scholars from invoking the C word, in a way we in
Europe find odd given how criticism of capitalism and
suggestions for possible post-capitalist political economies
and social orders has long been a perfectly legitimate form of
scholarly inquiry. It is almost as if some people can accept
the end of the world more readily than the end of
capitalism....Here, economism as used by Norgaard is closer to
the way it was defined by Lenin (quoted in the essay) as a
reformist rather than transformative political project in its
unwillingness to explicitly propose the replacing of
capitalism...but this is perhaps a minor quibble (but one
perhaps worthy of a future Great Transition discussion).<br>
<br>
I have myself long been convinced of the ideological character
of modern economics. Here, I make two related points. The
first is that there is no ideology-free conceptualisation of
the economy and economics: all forms of economic thinking are
at root forms of 'political economy' a fusion of ethical,
political, and normative prescriptions and principles with
empirical economic proposals in terms of policies or
suggestions for public policy. Political economy is of course
what Adam Smith and the great classical economists practiced,
fully aware of the political and ethical dimensions of their
ideas and proposals. It's a pity most modern economics
students have very little idea of the political economy roots
of the discipline they study . Instead, modern students of
neoclassical/capitalist economics (since there is little to no
pluralism in modern economics teaching) are completely
ignorant of either the normative or historical foundations of
discipline. In this context, what we in<br>
the universities churn our year after year in our economics
programmes are nothing short of 'technically competent
barbarians' (Barry, 2012).<br>
<br>
The second point relates more to the religious invocation used
by Norgaard to describe modern capitalist economics. Here,
viewing this religious dimension as essentially ideological in
another sense - that is masking and occluding power relations
or hidden normative assumptions conveniently smuggled in as
'axioms' for example - is a really important starting point
for the dethroning of this false religion of 'economism'. Here
we need to ask ourselves, in whose interest is this form of
'knowledge/power' deployed and inscribed in university
curricula, and what does it hide and why?<br>
<br>
How fragile as the assumptions behind market economics? asks
Norgaard rightly. Here are some more suggestions to add to the
ones he outlines.<br>
<br>
�Twelve Theses on Neo-Classical Economics�.<br>
<br>
1. the fact that the �economy� is the material/metabolic
foundation/bridge/link between the human and non-human worlds
also affects relations of power within human societies;<br>
<br>
2. neo-classical economics� purported objectivity,
�scientific� status, or �value neutrality� is false since it
is as value-laden and based on ethical and political
judgements, as other ethical or political position and
prescriptions;<br>
<br>
3. related to that, this lends economics the illusion of being
able to definitively establish the �truth�, mostly through its
use of quantitative and numeric methods, what Stephen Marglin
(2008: 136) calls the algorithmic �ideology of knowledge� of
economics;<br>
<br>
4. modern capitalist economics regards itself as defined by
its methodology and approach, which has (almost) universal
application to all human affairs, rather than a subject
matter, �the economy� per se ;<br>
<br>
5. the �naturalising� of the institutions of the modern market
economy � such as �the market�, �private property�,
�competition�, �efficiency� etc. � in such a way that these
are both �natural� (beyond the capacity of humans to alter)
and also �good�, if we want economic growth and material
well-being;<br>
<br>
6. which in turn establishes �economics� and �economists� as
the professional �experts� on how the economy works, thus
�crowding out� or marginalising �non-economic� and thus
�non-expert� commentary on or views about the economy;<br>
<br>
7. allowing its analyses and aims � most crucially the concept
and objective of orthodox �economic growth� � to be accepted
within a pluralist social context, i.e., it is something
almost all value/normative and political positions can accept,
endorse, and support as a self-evident �common good� (think of
how both left and right promote orthodox undifferentiated
economic growth uncritically);<br>
<br>
8. its capacity to deliver (albeit unequally) material
benefits to enough people often comes via hiding,
externalizing, or sequestering the social and environmental
costs of economic growth, but nevertheless it is regarded and
promoted as a form of knowledge that �works�;<br>
<br>
9. its supposed �non-political� character �related to 2 above,
which;<br>
<br>
10. supports powerful interests, groups, forms of thinking,
and institutions within society, and allows the by-passing of
ethical, political debate, and perhaps more crucially of all;<br>
<br>
11. its position as the �master discipline� or form of
knowledge within policy-making and political decision-making
by the state such that all discourse and debate must
ultimately be translated into a form acceptable to
neo-classical economics.<br>
<br>
12. which means that as well as �crowding out� rival accounts
of the economy, as well as political and ethical debate,
neo-classical economics �colonises� non-economic areas of
life, such as health, family, the domestic sphere, community,
and politics, i.e. , it moves outside its own subject area.<br>
<br>
While all of these �theses� are interlinked, it is the imputed
�value-free� (and therefore supposedly non-ethical and
non-political) character of modern neo-classical economics
that I particularly wish to focus on here. Simply put, the
study of the economy is not, and never can be, either a
politics- or ethics-free zone.<br>
<br>
My own work on critically examining orthodox, undifferentiated
GDP-measured economic growth as a permanent feature of the
economy has led me to analyse not just growth but
neoclassical/capitalist economics as by turns a form of
ideology, myth, religion, and cultural meme (Barry, 2015).
Revealing the ideological core of capitalist/neoclassical
economics is of course central to Norgaard�s essay.<br>
<br>
The ideological power of capitalist economics cannot and
should not be underestimated. Its comprehensive failure to
predict the current global economic crisis has led neither to
its displacing as a useful paradigm nor to the reforming and
reformulating of the paradigm (Barry, 2012). Rather, we have
witnessed what John Quiggin provocatively but correctly
denotes as 'Zombie economics' (Quiggin, 2010). That is, dead,
analytically useless (but politically and ideologically
powerful) ideas and nostrums that still reign over us in terms
of informing everything from 'commonsense' and everyday
understandings of the economy, to state economic policy, to
the political platforms of political parties (Barry, 2012).
This entails recognizing the �commonsense� and �taken for
granted� nature of capitalist economics and its emphasis on
growth, i.e. that almost everyone seems to at least tacitly,
if not explicitly, accept it. Thomas Homer-Dixon captures this
well in his statement that:<br>
<br>
�The tacit arrangement among our elites, our experts, and the
rest of us is essentially symbiotic - a mutually gratifying
and self-sustaining cycle of denial and delusion. Through our
acquiescence in and often active support of modern capitalism,
we legitimize our elites' and experts' status and power, while
those elites and experts give us an overarching ideology of
permanence, order, and purpose that lends our lives a sense of
place and meaning. According to this ideology, economic growth
is a panacea for all our social and personal problems. Growth
equals health. Unfortunately when we�re in denial, we can't
think about the various paths that we might take into the
future. Nor can we prepare to choose the best path when the
opportunity arises. Radically different futures become
literally inconceivable - they are �beyond imagining� in the
same way the heliocentric cosmos was inconceivable to many
people prior to the Copernican revolution.� (Homer-Dixon,
2006: 219)<br>
<br>
And we need to always remember that orthodox, capitalist
economists are called up to comment on the media not because
what they say is correct or true, but because they are asked,
because they are presumed to be and present themselves as the
authority on �the economy�. That is, it is from the fact that
orthodox economists have privileged access to some objectively
verifiable truth that their power and authority stems. Rather,
it is because ideologically we all accept that they so possess
this power: the power to discern whether the �market
fundamentals� are sound, to detect the prevailing or
anticipated moods of the Gods of the market. How different is
this from shamanism? Indeed, how different is the dogma of
austerity as cure for our current economic woes from other
societies that sacrificed their children to assuage the Gods
and ensure the harvest?<br>
<br>
I see Norgaard's article as an important contribution to the
project of dethroning and delegitimising
capitalist/neoclassical economics - similar to the view of
scholars such as Princen who have advocated the effective
delegitimisation of fossil fuels as an indispensable element
in decarbonising the economy and combatting climate change
(Princen et al, 2015). We need to see neoclassical economics
/economism for what it is�a form of groupthink�and we need
more like Norgaard to point to the emperor and say he has no
clothes. And as for what new clothes we need, what new 'ism'
as Norgaard put it, we need, my own suggestion (and in keeping
with Norgaard) is that we need an old/new political economy of
sustainability based on pluralism. We need context-specific
not one-size-fits-all logic, and one in which the myth of
endless economic growth is replaced with sufficiency, a sense
of �enoughness�, and (as the degrowth position has it) a focus
on redistribution of resources,<br>
economic wealth and opportunities. And perhaps above all else,
a new model of progress and prosperity beyond orthodox
economic growth which has done its job in the overdeveloped
world (Wilkinson and Pickett, 2009), and now passed the point
where it is causing more costs than benefits.<br>
<br>
It is high time we call a spade a spade and move on from not
just the dangerous myth of perpetual economic growth, but the
entire dominant economic system of thinking (which can be
viewed as form of religious, ideological and indeed mythic
thinking) and practices behind it - namely, carbon-fueled,
consumerist-dependent capitalism. To paraphrase, 'It�s
capitalism stupid'. And to invoke religious language, �the
truth will set us free�. And here we might best begin by
recognising that the enemy of truth is not falsehood but myth
and fantasy. As JF Kennedy noted:<br>
<br>
�The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie -
deliberate, contrived and dishonest - but the myth -
persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Too often we hold
fast to the clich�s of our forebears. We subject all facts to
a prefabricated set of interpretations. We enjoy the comfort
of opinion without the discomfort of thought. Mythology
distracts us everywhere - in government as in business, in
politics as in economics, in foreign affairs as in domestic
affairs.�<br>
<br>
And so Norgaard�s essay helps us see past the beguiling and
comforting myths of capitalist economics and to recognise both
the painful truth of economic mythic thinking (allied to a
powerful myth of techno-optimism and the capacity of human
beings to control the world). And thus begin to live in
sustainability as a consequence of recognising the multiple
dangers and risks of such false mythic thinking. But he also
rightly points out in his essay that we need alternatives to
the latter�s religious mythic doxa. After all, without vision
the people perish.<br>
<br>
In this way, I think the task before us is to 'live in truth',
as Vaclav Havel wisely put it, and equally importantly to
co-create and co-imagine new visions for how we want to live
in truth, justice, sustainability and solidarity with one
another in our particular places and storied residences, as
well as our more collective species story of living in peace
on and with our planet, our 'common home' as Pope Francis has
recently put it. Capitalism or our �common home�? (Pope
Francis, 2015). That is our choice.<br>
<br>
References<br>
<br>
Barry, J. (2012), The Politics of Actually Existing
Unsustainability: Human Flourishing in a Climate Changed,
Carbon Constrained World (Oxford: Oxford University Press).<br>
<br>
Barry, J. (2015), What's the Story with Growth?: Economic
Growth as Ideology, Myth, Cultural Meme and Religion<br>
available at: <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://www.researchgate.net/publication/280489369_Whats_the_Story_with_Unsustainable_Economic_Growth_Understanding_Economic_Growth_as_Ideology_Myth_Religion_and_Cultural_Meme"
rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">www.researchgate.net/publication/280489369_Whats_the_Story_with_Unsustainable_Economic_Growth_Understanding_Economic_Growth_as_Ideology_Myth_Religion_and_Cultural_Meme</a><br>
<br>
Boldeman, L (2007), The Cult of the Market: Economic
Fundamentalism and its Discontents (Canberra: ANU)<br>
<br>
Homer-Dixon, T, (2006), The Upside of Down: Catastrophe,
Creativity and the Renewal of Civilization, (Toronto: Alfred
A. Knopf).<br>
<br>
Marglin, S. (2008), The Dismal Science: How Thinking Like an
Economists undermines Community, Harvard: Harvard University
Press.<br>
<br>
Moore, J.W. (2014), �The Capitalocene Part I: On the Nature
& Origins of Our Ecological Crisis�, available at:<br>
<a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jason_Moore3/publication/264457281_The_Capitalocene_Part_II_Abstract_Social_Nature_and_the_Limits_to_Capital/links/53dfe3520cf27a7b830748fb.pdf"
rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">www.researchgate.net/profile/Jason_Moore3/publication/264457281_The_Capitalocene_Part_II_Abstract_Social_Nature_and_the_Limits_to_Capital/links/53dfe3520cf27a7b830748fb.pdf</a><br>
<br>
Pope Francis (2015), Encyclical Letter Laudato Si� of the Holy
Father Francis on Care for Our Common Home, available at:<br>
<a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa-francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si.html"
rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa-francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si.html</a><br>
<br>
Princen, T. Manno, J. and Martin, P. (eds), (2015), Ending the
Fossil Fuel Era (Boston: MIT Press).<br>
<br>
Quiggin, J (2010), Zombie Economics: How Dead Ideas Still Walk
among Us, (Princeton: Princeton University Press).<br>
<br>
Wilkinson, R. and Pickett, K (2009) The Spirit Level: Why more
Equal Societies Almost Always do Better, (London: Allen Lane).<br>
<br>
--John Barry--<br>
Queen's University Belfast<br>
<br>
*********************************************************************<br>
<br>
Friday, October 30, 2015<br>
<br>
>From Paul Raskin <<a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="mailto:praskin@tellus.org">praskin@tellus.org</a>><br>
<br>
-----<br>
GTN Friends:<br>
<br>
I write to launch our NOVEMBER DISCUSSION, which will consider
Richard Norgaard�s new GTI essay, �The Church of Economism and
Its Discontents.� Please read it at <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://www.greattransition.org/publication/the-church-of-economism-and-its-discontents"
rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">www.greattransition.org/publication/the-church-of-economism-and-its-discontents</a>,
and consider commenting.<br>
<br>
Is orthodox economics akin to a secular religion? Are we
living in the �Econocene�? Is there a way out? Norgaard, a
founder of ecological economics, argues yes, yes, and maybe.
In so doing, he guides us further into the terrain of
alternative economics we�ve explored recently in our
discussions of GTI pieces by Herman Daly, Giorgos Kallis,
Peter Barnes, and John Bellamy Foster.<br>
<br>
I wonder, though:<br>
* Is economism still a monolithic ideology? Or are critical
currents within the economics mainstream increasingly
questioning its reductionist framework and false predictions?<br>
* As a framing for our contemporary condition, is �the
Econocene� a useful corrective to the geologic emphasis of
�the Anthropocene�? How do these compare to GTI�s term, �The
Planetary Phase of Civilization,� which aims to convey the
multi-dimensionality of the globalizing social-ecological
system?<br>
<br>
I�d appreciate hearing your thoughts on these and other issues
raised by Norgaard�s stimulating essay.<br>
<br>
Comments are welcome through NOVEMBER 30.<br>
<br>
Looking forward,<br>
<br>
Paul Raskin<br>
GTI Director<br>
<br>
NOTE ON GTI�S PUBLICATION CYCLE:<br>
GTN discussions occur in ODD-NUMBERED months, and GTI
publishes in EVEN-NUMBERED months. Each discussion takes up a
new essay or viewpoint prior to its publication. After the
discussion closes, GTI publishes the piece, edited comments
from the discussion, and a response from the author (along
with other new articles). You can review all GTN discussions
at <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://www.greattransition.org/forum/gti-forum"
rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">www.greattransition.org/forum/gti-forum</a>.<br>
<br>
-------------------------------------------------------<br>
Hit reply to post a message<br>
Or see thread and reply online at<br>
<a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://www.greattransition.org/forum/gti-discussions/171-the-church-of-economism-and-its-discontents/1398"
rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.greattransition.org/forum/gti-discussions/171-the-church-of-economism-and-its-discontents/1398</a><br>
<br>
Need help? Email <a moz-do-not-send="true"
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