one of the sinking feelings I have long had about the mercantilist system and its offspring, modern economics, is the disturbing possibility that the whole idea is fundamentally flawed, and that therefore no amount of tinkering with the model (a la Marx) will suffice to "fix it" in the sense of any optimisation of human happiness.  and if human happiness is "not the point" then we may as well go back to building pyramids for Pharaoh...

dissident views which have influenced my thinking over the years include those of "feral economists" like Cobb and Waring, "outdated" economists like Galbraith, snook-cockers like Czech and Keen, and lateral thinkers  and social critics like Illich, Postman, Prieur, Jensen, Abbey, Callenbach, McKibben, Ritzer (Whitman, Thoreau, Vian, Goldman...), paleo/anthro/social historians like Diamond, Ponting, Braudel... plus speculative futurists of various flavours from Delaney through the cyberpunks, and paisano/indigeno movements worldwide.  I think the very breadth of sources needed to anchor a sweeping critique of contemporary assumptions makes a very high threshold for the endeavour, especially since one of the central assumptions of the structure to be critiqued is specialisation and credentialling.


The difference between theory and practise in practise ...