The Essentials of Economic Sustainability

The recent global financial crisis has raised widespread concern for the sustainability of the global economy. Much has been written concerning the negative impacts of economic development on natural ecosystems and civil societies. Unfortunately, few viable alternatives to the prevailing economic paradigms have been suggested for consideration. Those that have been are typically little more than suggestions for fine tuning capitalist or socialist economies.

In his new book, John Ikerd addresses the basic principles and concepts essential to economic sustainability. Some of these concepts are capitalist, some are socialistic, and others are general principles validated by philosophy or common sense. What results is a synthesis: something that is neither capitalist nor socialist but fundamentally different; it is sustainable. A special emphasis is placed on the essential, but limited, role of markets in economic sustainability, including the constraints that must be placed on markets to protect nature and society from economic exploitation.

Readers of any political and ideological persuasion will find this brief book engaging, informative, optimistic and refreshing. Instead of threats and apocalyptic pronouncements, Ikerd offers possibilities and assurance. Instead of epithets hurled at opponents, Ikerd offers possibilities for reconciliation and a renewed sense of the need to work cooperatively to find solutions to the most urgent problems of our era.

The Essentials of Economic Sustainability was written without references or examples to encourage readers to collaborate in the learning process by finding references and examples most appropriate to their particular situation or circumstances. References and examples relevant to the economic and political system of the United States can be found in Sustainable Capitalism, a Kumarian Press book by the same author.

John Ikerd spent the first half of his thirty-year academic career as a traditional free-market, neoclassical economist. He served on the faculties of four major state universities during his career: North Carolina State University, Oklahoma State University, the University of Georgia, and the University of Missouri. Growing concerns for the lack of ecological, social, and economic sustainability of American agriculture during the 1980s led to broader concerns for the lack of sustainability for American society in general. As an economist, Dr. Ikerd eventually came to understand that growing threats to ecological and social sustainability are rooted in the neoclassical paradigm of economic development, which is inherently extractive and exploitative, and thus, is not sustainable. Dr. Ikerd spent the last half of his academic career and much of his time since retirement developing and testing the concepts and principles of an alternative development paradigm, the economics of sustainability, which are elucidated in this book.