“Ethical Markets congratulates our Club of Rome colleagues Anders Wijkman and Ernst U. von Weizsacker on the important new book, “COME ON: Capitalism, Short-termism. Population and the Destruction of the Planet” from Springer at : www.springer.com/gb/book/9781493974184
~Hazel Henderson, Editor”
“*Come On”*- /Capitalism, Short-termism, Population and the Destruction of the Planet -/
We are pleased to announce that “*Come On*”- the new report to the Club of Rome –co-authored by the two of us and with contributions from more than 30 members of the Club –is now available. Springer Nature (New York) is the publisher
The book is prepared for the 50th Anniversary in 2018 of the Club of Rome. It is a follow-up to the Club of Rome’s landmark report “The Limits to Growth”, that was published in 1972 and sold more than thirty million copies.
The Limits report remains a cornerstone of the Club’s philosophy. But new challenges must be addressed such as climate change, irresponsible financial markets, the digital economy and other disruptive technology trends, an increasingly skewed distribution of income and wealth and the crisis of democracy. In addition we have to question the viability of the “Sustainable Development Goals”. Not the goals in themselves. They are worthy. Rather whether they can be attained based on today´s policies and thinking. In our assessment the environment goals risk being crushed by conventional growth policies.
We are living in the Full World, with nearly eight billion people. But our thinking, our religions and our economic doctrines stem from the Empty World, when the population was between one and two billion people.
In the Empty World the desire for more fish was easily satisfied through more nets and rods and fishermen. In the Full World the desire for more fish implies very strict rules against overfishing. Note the difference? The need to rethink economics is one of the leading themes in Come On.
“*Come On*”has three Parts:
1.Present trends are not sustainable. They will render the Full World dangerously vulnerable.
2.Our economic growth paradigm must be overhauled. We are in need of a New Enlightenment for the Full World.
/Balance/ stands at the core of the New Enlightenment. Balance between /humans and nature, between short and long term, between market forces and the rule setting state, between private consumption and public goods, between justice and rewards for excellence, between speed and stability./
3.But we have to urgently act now! These chapters are full of optimism, showing a great number of technologies and different ways to organise things that could be done within the present system and would move the world towards sustainability. We suggest policy measures aiming at bringing the positive examples into the mainstream. One basic rule is to tax the consumption of scarce natural goods and to lower tax on labour. Also some novel considerations are offered for global governance and how to rein in financial markets.
We hope the book will be disseminated widely. The German translation, launched in October, is already an Amazon and Springer best seller. The easiest way to order is via Springer:
*http://www.springer.com/gb/book/9781493974184*
May we ask you to circulate this message to at least twenty of your friends. Make that a peaceful chain-reaction!