Also worth reading
A mass of mainstream literature about the meltdown aspires to be wise after the event and so is scarcely the most reliable guide to the future. Even the Economist magazine, traditionally at the forefront of reasoned neoliberal debate, has been forced to adopt contorted poses. Few indeed are those who understood what was happening at the time and so are well placed to suggest what now needs to be done. By far the most consistently perceptive is, to my mind, Walden Bello, whose Deglobalization: ideas for a new world economy (Zed Books, updated edition 2004) first appeared in 2002. No doubt his engagement in radical democratic politics in the Philippines, and his viewpoint from the Global South, has helped him to get it more right than most. An improbable source of foresight is Graham Turner, whose day job is forecasting for the City of London. The Credit Crunch (Pluto Press, 2008) was the first to recommend ‘quantitative easing’; No Way to Run an Economy: why the system failed and how to put it right (Pluto Press, 2009) contains a devastating if sideways assault on corporate globalization. Hard going and technical, but authoritative and worth it. Peter Stalker’s No-Nonsense Guide to Global Finance (New Internationalist, 2009) surely cannot be bettered as a tour round the simple truths behind this unduly convoluted topic. Finally, People First Economics (New Internationalist, 2009 – an anthology edited by Vanessa Baird and myself) explores the lush pastures beyond the dim orthodoxy that has failed us all so badly.
