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Resources for Economics & Technologies: Books, Reports, & Newsletters

Books:

1. The Informal Economy Revisited: Examining the Past, Envisioning the Future, edited by Martha Chen and Françoise Carré, is an open access book that bridges a range of disciplinary perspectives including anthropology, development economics, law, political science, social policy, sociology, statistics, urban planning and design. It also focuses on specific groups of informal workers, including home-based workers, street vendors and waste pickers. (checked on 16 Jul. 2020)

2. Pluriverse: A Post-Development Dictionary contains over 100 essays on transformative initiatives and alternatives to the currently dominant processes of globalized development, including its structural roots in modernity, capitalism, state domination, and masculinist values. It offers critical essays on mainstream solutions that ‘greenwash’ development, and presents radically different worldviews and practices from around the world that point to an ecologically wise and socially just world. (checked on 16 May 2019) Read the introduction and an essay on this book: ‘Development’ is Colonialism in Disguise (checked on 11 Sep. 2019) Download the entire book (checked on 12 Sep. 2020)
3. Free, Fair and Alive: the Insurgent Power of the Commons by David Bollier and Silke Helfrich – an expansive, thorough and deeply thoughtful guide to a possible future politics. It analyses the contours of successful experiments in how humans have come together to make their worlds freer, fairer and more alive. Read a review here. (checked on 22 Jan. 2020)

4. Transition Town Movement: Local Action in the Wake of Global Emergency and Collapse by T Vijayendra, Usha Rao and Shreekumar. This booklet describes the nature of the global emergency and the origin of the transition town movement. It then focuses on the possibilities of transition India and the issues involved. Finally there is a section on resources – books, websites and videos. It is a call and guide to youth to become active in meeting this emergency that they are facing! (checked on 31 Aug. 2023)

5. Beyond Money: A Post-Capitalist Strategy by Anitra Nelson. Grounded in historical debates about money, this book deepens our understanding of how money is the driver of political power, environmental destruction and social inequality today, arguing that it has to be abolished rather than repurposed to achieve a postcapitalist future. (checked on 15 Feb. 2022)

6. Pluriversal learning: pathways toward a world of many worlds by Susan Paulson. In varied contexts around the world, groups and communities forging different kinds of futures are challenging the universal desirability of development toward ever-greater production, consumption, and ecological footprints. This article reviews empirical research on wide-ranging phenomena, and documents processes of mutual learning among researchers from varied cultural, linguistic, and national backgrounds. (checked on 12 Nov. 2019)
7. Post-growth Thinking in India: Towards Sustainable Egalitarian Alternatives by Julien-François Gerber and Rajeswari S. Raina calls for a resizing and reorganisation of the social metabolism that would allow societies to live within their ecological means, and within democratic, equitable, and localised economies. The chapters in this book, some of which are Indian contributions to knowledge and policy, seek diverse alternatives to the current growth-driven model of development. (checked on 19 Apr. 2019)
8. Ecology, Equity and the Economy by Gurudas Nulkar covers the history of trade and commerce and analyses what went wrong at each stage. The discussions steer towards what the economic system should have achieved for humanity, what sustainable development is and the possible nature of the new economy. (checked on 18 Feb. 2019)
9. Vivir bien as an alternative to neoliberal globalization by Eija Ranta, on the notion of vivir bien/suma qamaña/sumak kawsay in Bolivia. (checked on 19 Jul. 2019)
10. Nowtopia is a book about a new politics of work. It profiles tinkerers, inventors, and improvisational spirits who bring an artistic approach to important tasks that are ignored or undervalued by market society. Rooted in practices that have been emerging over the past few decades, Nowtopia’s exploration of work locates an important thread of self-emancipatory class politics beyond the traditional arena of wage-labor. (checked on 7 Oct. 2019)
11. In Of Poverty and Plastic: Scavenging and Scrap Trading Entrepreneurs in India’s Urban Informal Economy author Kaveri Gill explores the socio-economics of waste and of the commodity chains involved in recycling. In developing theoretical ideas about poverty, agency and choice, the politics of caste and patronage, the institutions and regulation of markets and judicial activism, this book illustrates how grounded field research contributes to practical policies of urban land-use, pollution, and livelihoods. Its study of garbage collectors, scavengers, and the plastic recycling or scrap trading self-employed entrepreneurs reveals a very complex pattern of organisation and linkages with the market economy and productive employment. (checked on 27 Mar. 2018)
12. Alternative Futures: India Unshackled, (Edited by Ashish Kothari and K. J. Joy) with 35 essays on the future of India, seen through the lens of practitioner-thinkers from various sectors: arts and crafts, environment/conservation, gender and sexuality, minorities, culture, localisation, cities and villages, knowledge and technology, health, water / energy / biomass /food, pastoralism, adivasis, dalits, industry and markets/bazaars, democracy, law, education, transportation, and ideologies. Read a review of this volume by Mark Tully (checked on 27 Feb. 2018). A discussion on this book as part of RED Conversaions Series. Another review of the book by Sagar Dhara (checked on 16 Jan. 2019).
13. Alternatives in a World of Crisis brings together a selection of texts portraying transformative processes around the world that are emblematic in that they been able to change their situated social realities in multiple ways, addressing different axes of domination simultaneously, and anticipating forms of social organization that configure alternatives to the commodifying, patriarchal, colonial, and destructive logics of modern capitalism. (checked on 9 Jul. 2019)
14. Climate adaptation: Accounts of Resilience, Self-sufficiency and Systems Change (an anthology). (Checked on 11 Nov. 2021)

15. Cultivating Knowledge: Biotechnology, Sustainability, and the Human Cost of Cotton Capitalism in India by Andrew Flachs, shows how rural farmers come to plant genetically modified or certified organic cotton, sometimes during moments of agrarian crisis. Farmers’ evaluation of development is a complex and shifting calculation of social meaning, performance, economics, and personal aspiration. Only by understanding this complicated nexus can we begin to understand sustainable agriculture. (checked on 12 Nov. 2019)

16. संकटग्रस्त दुनिया में विकल्प – ‘Alternatives in a World of Crisis’ adapted into Hindi language. (checked on 9 Jul. 2019)
17. Local is Our Future by Helena Norberg-Hodge connects the dots between the world’s social, economic, ecological and spiritual crises, and describes how simple steps towards the local (local food, local economies, etc) can lead to a more vibrant and fulfilling future for both humanity and the planet. (checked on 9 Jul. 2019)
18. The Development Dictionary – a guide to Knowledge as Power, edited by Wolfgang Sachs. This classic, published in the 1990s, reviews the key concepts of the development discourse. It contains essays each of which examines one concept from a historical and anthropological point of view and highlights its particular bias. (18 Aug. 2017)
19. Doughnut Economics by Kate Raworth attempts to reframe the economy. It deconstructs the character of ‘rational economic man’ and explains what really makes us tick. The author creates a new, cutting-edge economic model that is fit for the 21st century – one in which a doughnut-shaped compass points the way to human progress. (checked on 15 Jul. 2019)
20. TechRasam’s Tech4Good Handbook has a set of 35+ free/discounted tools and resources ranging across Fundraising, Marketing, Operations, Payroll Management, Project management, Data & MIS and more. (checked on 11 Oct. 2017)
21. Growth: From Microorganisms to Megacities by author Vaclav Smil who states that  ‘Growth must end. Our economist friends don’t realise that’. That is the title of an essay on the book by Jonathan Watts.

22. The booklet Re-making the World published by DVV International is about all the ‘ordinary’ women and men (pushed to the margins of the political and economic mainstream) who demonstrate their resilience and agency against an oppressive system, sometimes flourishing as they do so. (checked on 30 May 2017)

23. The Routledge Handbook of Ecological Economics (Clive L. Spash, editor) provides a rich understanding of how biophysical reality relates to and integrates with social reality. Chapters provide succinct overviews of the literature covering a range of subject areas including: heterodox thought on the environment; society, power and politics, markets and consumption; value and ethics; science and society; methods for evaluation and policy analysis; policy challenges; and the future post-growth society. (checked on 16 Jun. 2017)
24. A New Paradigm for Sustainable Development? Summary of the Deliberations of the Club de Madrid Working Group on Environmental Sustainability and Shared Societies. (checked on 30 July 2017)
25. In more than fifty original essays, Patterns of Commoning published by The Commons Strategies Group probes the inner complexities of this timeless social paradigm. The book surveys some of the most notable, inspiring commons around the world, from alternative currencies and open design and manufacturing, to centuries-old community forests and co-learning commons—and dozens of others. (checked on 16 Feb. 2017)
26. Management of Land and other Resources for Inclusive Growth: India 2050 by G N Kathpalia and Rakesh Kapoor. This paper proposes an alternative holistic model for urban and rural development taken up in tandem that can, in the long run, promote a rational and equitable utilization of national resources and economic growth. (checked on 8 May 2017)
27. Green Growth: Ideology, Political Economy and the Alternatives by Gareth Dale Manu V. Mathai Jose A. Puppim de Oliveira outlines three main lines of critique on the green growth project. It asks: what explains modern society’s investment in it, why has it emerged as a master concept in the contemporary conjuncture, and what social forces does it serve? Second, it unpicks and explains the contradictions within a series of prominent green growth projects. Finally, it weighs up the merits and demerits of alternative strategies and policies, asking the vital question: ‘if not green growth, then what?’ (checked on 20 Mar. 2017)
28. Churning the Earth: The Making of Global India. Aseem Shrivastava and Ashish Kothari, Viking/Penguin 2012. A detailed critique of economic globalisation in India and its impacts on people and the environment; and a search for alternatives. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015). Hindi (much shorter) version: पृथ्वी मंथन – वैश्विक भारत बनाने की कहानी (checked on 13 Nov. 2021)
29. A Dignity Economy: Creating an Economy that Serves Human Dignity and Preserves Our Planet, by Evelin Lindner, approaches the role of economics and monetary structures for right relationships—mutually beneficial and just relationships, economic and otherwise—with the necessary humility, but also with due candidness. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
30. Mansoor Khan the author of the The Third Curve: the end of growth will present a series of lectures in various places. To track and note his lectures please check the Calendar on his webpage. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
31. Bazaars, Conversations and Freedom: For a Market Culture Beyond Greed and Fear, Rajni Bakshi, Penguin, New Delhi, 2009. Stories and ideas from around the world on how markets can work for society, rather than become its master; includes examples of community-created currencies, cooperation and caring, and other forms of exchange and trade that works for all. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)

32. Gender Challenges – Volumes 1, 2 and 3 consists of selected essays from the last 30 years by Bina Agarwal, a renowned academic of gender studies. It identifies key issues and addresses the emerging challenges to women empowerment. (checked on 21 Dec. 2015)

33. Bapu Kuti: Journeys in Rediscovery of Gandhi, by Rajni Bakshi, Penguin, India, 1998. Stories from various Indian initiatives at local self-sufficiency, social transformation, and living simply. (checked on 9 Nov. 2017)
34. In the book titled J.C. Kumarappa: Mahatma Gandhi’s Economist (Popular Prakashan, Mumbai, 2007), M. Lindley brings to life a long-forgotten and under-rated economist who systematised Gandhi’s thoughts into an ‘economics of permanence’.
35. Alternatives to Privatisation: Public Options for Essential Services in the Global South,(Ebook) ed. by David A. McDonald and Greg Ruiters, LeftWord Books, New Delhi, 2012. Has chapters on health, water, power, gender and other aspects including cases and material from India. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
36. ‘Where Women are Leaders: The SEWA Movement in India‘ is a narrative history of the Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA), the 40,000-strong union of India’s poorest women which increasingly become an inspiration to and living example of a new development model relevant to marginalized, low-income women worldwide. Published by Zed Books Ltd. in 1992, this book by Kalima Rose reveals the process of organizing for social change. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
37. The case for Degrowth, a small book by Giorgos Kallis, Susan Paulson, Giacomo D’Alisa and Federico Demaria. It transforms visions and recommendations into a coherent set of actions, from our individual choices to macro-economics and politics. It is about living well with less, by living differently, prioritizing wellbeing, equity and sustainability. (checked on 19 Oct. 2020)
38. In Defense of Degrowth:  Opinions and Manifestos by Giorgos Kallis. Chapters range from range from topics such as eco-modernism, the history of economics, science fiction, the Greek crisis, and Hollywood films. The book also features debates and exchanges between Kallis and degrowth detractors. (checked on 5 Jul. 2018) [The idea of degrowth calls on wealthy consumers to cut back their own earth-destroying pursuit of happiness through the acquisition of material objects or fossil-fueled experiences]
39. Degrowth: A Vocabulary for a New Era, edited by Giacomo D’Alisa, Federico Demaria and Giorgos Kallis (Routledge, 2014). The book offers a comprehensive coverage of the main topics and major challenges of degrowth in a succinct, simple and accessible manner. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
40. Polarizing Development: Alternatives to Neoliberalism and the Crisis, edited by Lucia Pradella and Thomas Marois, is a collection of essays that elaborate worldwide strategies for moving beyond neoliberalism and the economic crisis. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
41. The book The Limits to Capitalist Nature: Theorizing and Overcoming the Imperial Mode of Living, authored by Ulrich Brand and Markus Wissen and published by Rowman & Littlefield International, provides for a historical-materialist understanding of the multiple crises of capitalism, focusing on the ecological crisis and its interaction with other crisis phenomena and proposes a democratisation of societal nature relations as a way out of the crisis that requires overcoming capitalist property relations and the exclusive forms of controlling nature guaranteed by them. (checked on 28 Mar. 2018)

Articles & Reports:

1. What if Local and Diverse Is Better Than Networked and Global? Helena Norberg Hodge has been arguing for localism since the 1970s, but the pandemic is making the Australian activist-scholar’s ideas more relevant than ever. She saw in the self-reliance, local competency and cohesion of Ladakh, around 1975, a vision of a working future. (checked on 14 Oct. 2020)
2. Pluriversality and beyond: consolidating radical alternatives to (mal-)development as a Commonist project by Barry K. Gills and S. A. Kamed Hosseini. This article addresses contradictions in the ‘pluriverse’ of radical alternatives to maldevelopment, and proposes a an integrative framework for fostering productive convergences among its forces. It argues that the 2020s and 2030s will be pivotal decades, in which the current global conjuncture, characterized by intensifying economic turmoil, climate change, and ecological crises, will translate into increased mass discontent, global polarization, political instabilities, and social unrest across the world. (checked on 31 Mar. 2022)
3. In Austria, the Government Pays to Repair Your Stuff by Kaja Šeruga. Taking the “right to repair” one step further, a Viennese repair bonus is going national — and keeping thousands of items out of the junkyard. (checked on 31 Mar. 2022)
4. Role of dams on the floods of August 2018 in Periyar River Basin, Kerala by Sudheer et al investigates the role of dams in this calamity. (checked on 25 Aug. 2020) Role of dams in Kerala floods: Distortion of Science by J. Harsha is an evidence based critique / review of the former article. (checked on 25 Aug. 2020)

5. Ending the Growth Addiction – Pallav Das in conversation with Alnoor Ladha and Jason Hickel, touching upon the possibilities of shorter working weeks and sharing of jobs, universal basic income which has the potential to help us rethink our relationship to work and meaningless jobs, shifting to locally made stuff, depending more on commons, etc. (checked on 12 Feb. 2019)

6. In UN ‘sustainable’ development goals’ hijacking our compassion for the world the author presents a critical view of UN SDGs and leads the reader to reflect on the SDGs in totality and see what is it that we are really supporting and nurturing. (checked on 21 Jan. 2019)

7. Localization: a strategic alternative to globalized authoritarianism by Helena Norberg-Hodge. The author  explains why, for peace, equality and the future of the planet, we need to scale down and decentralize economic activity, giving communities and local economies the ability to meet as many of their own needs as possible, including the human need for connection. (checked on 27 Jul. 2018)

8. The Dirty Truth about Clean Energy by Carlos Zorillo.  A single mining project can easily impact thousands of hectares of land – land that can be covered in primary tropical forest harboring dozens of endangered species of animals and plants, as well as protecting key watersheds, and mitigating the effects of climate change.   If mining companies were forced to put a real price tag on ecosystem services and all other kinds of wealth within a proposed mining project that would be negatively affected, the balance would be invariably tilt in favor of protecting these areas. (checked on 25 May 2022)

9. Moneyless economics and non-hierarchical exchange values in Chiapas, Mexico by Erin Araujo p. 147-170   (checked on 24 Nov. 2021)

10. Is post-capitalism post-money? by Anitra Nelson. The key principles of how a world based on real values might operate, how characteristics of such a world are embodied in the Zapatista movement and how relevant skills that focus on direct democracy and material justice are emerging in ‘green materialist’ tendencies of contemporary anti-capitalist currents. (This article includes revised and direct extracts from Anitra Nelson’s book Beyond Money: A Postcapitalist Strategy) (checked on 15 Feb. 2022)

11. Constructing Alternative Socio-technical Worlds: Re-imagining RRI through SRI India by C Shambu Prasad. Through the case study of the System of Rice Intensification (SRI), an agroecological innovation that arose outside the formal research establishment, they show how vulnerable farming communities can proactively co-create alternatives to existing dilemmas in Indian agriculture. (checked on 10 Mar. 2020)
12. In Post-Growth and Post-Extractivism: Two Sides of the Same Cultural Transformation (translated by Dana Brablec), author Alberto Acosta argues that we need a vision that overcomes the fetish of economic growth, that is conducive to the de-commodification of Nature and of common goods, the decentralisation and the change in production and consumption structures, the redistribution of wealth and power, as the basis for a strategy of collective and constant construction of another economy, essential for a different civilisation. (checked on 8 Aug. 2019)
13. Farmer Producer Companies in India: Demystifying the Numbers by Annapurna Neti, Richa Govil and Madhushree R. Rao provides a new estimate of the number of producer companies, their geographic spread, the current status of their registration, and their authorised and paid-up capital, based on a dataset constructed using information from the Registrar of Companies under the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA). (checked on 11 Mar. 2020)
14. 7 steps to build a democratic economy: The Future is Public conference report (pdf file) – a report based on the panels, workshops and discussions of the international Future is Public: Democratic Ownership of the Economy conference that took place on 4-5 December, 2019 in Amsterdam’s South-East borough, the Bijlmermeer. (checked on 9 Mar. 2020)
15. The Real Economy by Damaris Zehner. Homemakers are  are essential to the real economy. If we as home-makers spend more time making our own things and managing our own day-to-day survival, our lives will actually be more pleasurable rather than less.  (checked on 9 Oct. 2019)

16. The Idea That ‘Green Technology’ Can Help Save the Environment Is Dangerous by Godwin Vasanth Bosco.  In a bid to reduce the extraction of hydrocarbons for fuel as well as to manufacture components for more efficient electronic and mechanical systems, industrialists around the world have been extracting a wide array of minerals and metals, destroying entire ecosystems and displacing hundreds of thousands of people. It’s as if one injustice has replaced another.

17. Rewriting Haiti’s Narrative: Ten Haitian Entrepreneurs Helping To Reinvent Their Nation by James Ellsmoor is about ten young entrepreneurs who are creating opportunity in this Caribbean island nation to uplift Haiti’s environmental, economic and social landscape. (checked on 28 Dec. 2018)
18. The Degrowth Movement Challenges the Conventional Wisdom on Economic Health by Juliette Legendre. The leaders of the degrowth movement don’t just challenge growth indicators. They’re taking on the dogma of economic growth. (checked on 29 Jan. 2019)

19. Why we need ‘technologies of reunion’ by Charles Eisenstein. The author’s view is that we need a parallel system of technology development that can guide society as conventional systems unravel and conventional technologies fail to adequately address our problems. (checked on 24 Jul. 2018)

20. Scientists accidentally create mutant enzyme that eats plastic bottles, by Damian Carrington. The breakthrough, spurred by the discovery of plastic-eating bugs at a Japanese dump, could help solve the global plastic pollution crisis. (checked on 17 Apr. 2018)

21. Middle Classes and Consumption – a chapter by Ashish Kothari in the book The New Middle Class in India and Brazil edited by Dawid Danilo Bartelt and Axel Harneit-Sievers. (checked on 9 Feb. 2018)
22. Degrowth Consume less. Share more. by Rajni Bakshi. Discusses a vision of a society with a stable and leaner metabolism, where well-being stems from equality, relation, and simplicity rather than concentrations of material wealth. (checked on 2018)
23. The “Nobel Prize” for Economics 2019… illustrates the nature and inadequacy of conventional economics by Ted Trainer of Simplicity Institute.  He ponders on what the goals of a more acceptable conception of “development” might be. One suggestion, enabling all to enjoy a high quality of life in ecologically sustainable ways. (checked on 22 Dec. 2019)

24. Economy of Permanence: The enduring legacy of J.C. Kumarappa – a tribute to Kumarappa by Pranjali Bandhu, editor of his collected writings. J.C. Kumarappa was a stalwart of India’s freedom movement, Gandhian economic philosopher, pioneer in the development of village and cottage industries and advocate of a decentralised, localised economy of permanence and freedom. (checked on 28 Jun. 2018)

25. The Post-Development Dictionary agenda: paths to the pluriverse by Federico Demariaa and Ashish Kothari. This article lays out both a critique of the oxymoron ‘sustainable development’, and the potential and nuances of a Post-Development agenda. It presents ecological swaraj from India and Degrowth from Europe as two examples of alternatives to development. (checked on 18 Aug. 2017)
26. Building sustainable social and solidarity economies: Place-based and network-based strategies of alternative development organizations in India by Ashok Kumbamu. This article critically examines and analyzes place-based as well as network-based strategies of alternative development organizations that claim to be building sustainable social and solidarity economies in the political context of neoliberal globalization. Using a case study approach, this article analyzes how social and solidarity economy initiatives are aiming to reclaim control over the local agri-food sector. (checked on 24 Oct. 2017)

27. In Matching Resources to Needs – Moving the Flow of Gifting from Theory to Practice author Miki Kashtan ponders – dependence on others doesn’t make us helpless, even as infants, because our expression of need carries sufficient power. If others give to us just because we have needs, then we have the experience of unconditional receiving, since there is neither an expectation nor capacity for exchange. Why, then, is it so difficult for so many of us to receive without giving, even more than to give without receiving? (checked on 27 Aug. 2019)

28. In Beyond Money: A Postcapitalist Strategy Anitra Nelson draws on a spectrum of political and economic thought and activism, including feminism, eco-anarchism, degrowth, autonomism, Marxism and eco-socialism. The book shows that, by organising around post-money versions of the future, activists have a hope of creating a world that embodies radical values and visions. (checked on 20 May 2022)

29. Your money or your life? Putting wellbeing before GDP by Richard Eckersley. He writes about signs that Governments are getting the message that growth in GDP is a poor measure of national progress and people’s welfare; and based on his observations, wonders whether numbers (indices of measurement of well-being) have become an end in themselves, a ‘scorecard’ of performance, rather than being used as one means of creating deeper, richer stories of humanity and its future. (checked on 30 Dec. 2019)

30. New research shows community forest management reduces both deforestation and poverty. A study by Dr Johan Oldekop et al in Nepal demonstrates that community forest management has achieved a clear win-win for people and the environment across an entire country. Nepal proves that with secure rights to land, local communities can conserve resources and prevent environmental degradation. (checked on 14 May 2019)
31. In Get Rich Or Die Trying: The Case for a New Politics of Time author Aidan Harper asks whether free time is a better measure of economic success than GDP. He reports that the Green Party (of UK) has called for GDP to be replaced as a measure of national wellbeing with a Free Time Index showing how much free time people have to enjoy, arguing that leisure can contribute more to overall happiness than wealth. (checked on 30 Oct. 2018)
32. Report of the Symposium on SDGs, Knowledge and Democracy: Re-imagining Purposes and Opportunities (January 2017) – organised by the new Department of International Relations and Governance Studies, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, SNU, and the Centre for Studies in Science Policy, JNU, enabled discussion on the SDGs and arrived at a research and educaiton agenda that the participants would engage with. (checked on 3 Aug. 2017)
33. Economics among the road scholars by Jean Drèze is about action-oriented research or ‘research for action’ – research aimed at contributing to practical change. (checked on 17 Jan. 2018)
34. In Decent Living Standards: Material Prerequisites for Human Wellbeing, the authors Narasimha D. Rao and Jihoon Min have proposed a universal set of material commodities and conditions that households and societies require, at a minimum, for overcoming poverty and supporting a decent life for all. (checked on 29 May 2017)

35. Sustainability Dynamics of Resource Use and Economic Growth: A Discussion on Sustaining the Dynamic Linkages between Renewable Natural Resources and the Economic System by Mihir Mathur and Swati Agarwal, TERI, discusses why a conscious effort to manage consumption in a way to allow the stocks of renewable resources to regenerate before their decline becomes irreversible should be made. (checked on 25 Dec. 2015)

36. Adaptive injustice: Responsibility to act in the plastics economy by Katie Conlon. Just as society had to be taught to use plastics in the 1950s, we can collectively relearn how to revalue the materials we use and opt for materials that ‘do not harm.’ The whole concept of packaging should evolve to be synonymous with ‘second life’ and full lifecycle accountability. (checked on 12 Nov. 2019, available only until 28 Dec. 2019)
37. It’s a wrap on another season of Eco India – a look at the major sustainability trends, innovations and practices that were featured. (checked on 20 Jan. 2020)

38. Inside the new economic science of capitalism’s slow-burn energy collapse, And why the struggle for a new economic paradigm is about to get real by Nafeez Ahmed advocates that with capitalism-as-we-know it in inexorable decline, the urgent task ahead is to rewrite economics to fit the real-world: and, accordingly, to redesign our concepts of value and prosperity, precisely to rebuild our societies with a view of adapting to this extraordinary age of transition. (checked on 25 ug. 2017)

39. How technology will destroy low-wage and middle class jobs the world over and What can governments do when jobs run out? by Sushil Aaron are two parts of an article, which review Martin Ford’s Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future. (checked on 25 Jan. 2017)
40. The crisis of Capitalism, role of technology and our imaginations by Samantha Camacho, Jerome Scott, Alfredo Lopez and Melanie Bush helps us understand the urgent need for a proactive societal role in harnessing the energy and potential of the Internet in creating a sustainable future for the planet. (checked on 10 Oct. 2020)

41. How noble was the Nobel this time? by Gurudas Nulkar refers to the Nobel prize awareded to William Nordhaus for work on Climate Change, and asks the globally relevant question, whether economics deserves a Nobel at all. (checked on 27 Nov. 2018)

42. In the paper Sustainable Development and Degrowth, authors Swati Agarwal and Mihir Mathur argue that  countries would need to rely heavily on natural resources in order to meet the global low carbon growth agenda. (checked on 14 Oct. 2015)
43. Innovation for de-growth: A case study of counter-hegemonic practices from Kerala, India by Mario Pansera and Richard Owen. (checked on 9 May 2017)
44. The Credit Commons: A Money for the Solidarity Economy – This paper describes Credit Commons as a proposed solution to a set of problems with the money system. (checked on 22 Mar. 2017)
45. In Limits to growth: policies to steer the economy away from disaster, Samuel Alexandar argues that living in a degrowth economy would actually increase well-being, both socially and environmentally. But what would it take to get there? (checkedk on 10 Nov. 2017)

46. ‘Stunning Rebuke to Predatory Wall Street Megabanks’ as California Gov. Signs Law Allowing Creation of Public Banks by Jake Johnson.  California (US) Gov. signed into law (Oct. 2019) historic legislation that would allow the state’s cities and counties to establish public banks as an alternative to private financial institutions (thus putting people before Wall Street profits), a move advocates hailed as a “stunning rebuke to the predatory Wall Street megabanks that crashed the global economy in 2007-08.” (checked on 7 Oct. 2019)

47. Matthew Slater on scaling trust with Credit Commons – an interview by Bruno Chies. Matthew Slater is a community currency engineer. He proposes a technology that will scale trust and solidarity beyond the local level, for communities running their economy with their own currencies. ‘You could do the whole global economy that way’, Slater envisions in this new monetary architecture of interconnected complementary currencies. (checked on 22 Mar. 2017)
48. Cowry Collective timebank is a people-of-color-led network engaged in reciprocal exchange of services, skills, and goods through timebanking, where the currency exchanged is the time spent by members. Through membership in the timebank, people create and strengthen community bonds, build economic freedom by providing an alternative means of meeting needs and desires, and encourage creativity in redefining self-sufficiency, interdependence and valuation of time. (checked on 22 Oct. 2018)
49. The India Biodiversity Awards, launched by the Ministry of Environment Forests and Climate Change in partnership with the United Nations Development Progamme, recognise excellence in biodiversity governance across the country. This press release covers the Awards for 2016.  (checked on 11 Jun. 2016)
50. Curbing Consumption is the only way to Avoid Climate Change – according to authors of the paper, Swati Agarwal and Mihir Mathur, finding new ways to continue with the same model of growth and consumption will do no more that to put enormous pressure on finite resources.  (checked on 14 Oct. 2015)

51. Alternative Currencies Are Bigger Than Bitcoin: How They’re Building Prosperity From London to Kenya by Raúl Carrillo shows how the Brixton Pound, Koru Kenya, and Mazacoin are all attempting to achieve a common goal: empowering people in a monetarily unequal world, from the bottom up. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)

52. Addressing rural decline by valuing agricultural ecosystem services and treating food production as a social contribution, by Surendra Pratap Singh and Vishal Singh, presents an analysis of the scope of giving ecinomic incentives to farmers to improve rural life. (checked on 14 Apr. 2016)
53. Creative Economy Report 2013 Special Edition – Widening Local Development Pathways. The report, published by UNESCO and UNDP, strongly advocates the need to see the creative economy in humanistic terms – creativity as an embodied, lived quality informing a diverse range of industries and activities. (checked on 14 Mar. 2016)

54. Transparent solar panels created by Michigan State University can be efficiently deployed in a wide range of settings, from “tall buildings with lots of windows or any kind of mobile device that demands high aesthetic quality like a phone or e-reader.” (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)

55. Sustainable development is failing but there are alternatives to capitalism: An article by Ashish Kothari, Federico Demaria and Alberto Acosta about how environmental justice movements are challenging growth-oriented development and neoliberal capitalism all over the world and alternatives being experimented with – alternatives which are internally diverse, but which express common fundamental values, including solidarity, harmony, diversity and oneness within nature. (checked on 3 Sep. 2015)

56. The migration crisis and the imperial mode of living: Notes toward a degrowth internationalism by Miriam Lang argues that an up-to-date perspective on inter-peoples-relations should clearly tackle the root causes of forced migration by effectively reducing the energy and matter consumed in the global North, and, at the same time, develop new approaches for a global social welfare that do not consider welfare as a privilege related to one’s dwelling place or birth right. (checked on 9 Apr. 2018)

57. Community-Based Insurance for Goats: Experiences and Learning – an article from Ibtada, Alwar, Rajasthan. (checked on 6 Jul. 2015)
58. Local currencies for purposive degrowth? A quality check of some proposals for changing money-as-usual – in this paper the author Kristofer Dittmer assesses the performance of four widespread local currency types with respect to degrowth-related criteria, and argues that the degrowth movement would improve its chances of contributing to purposive degrowth by prioritizing government-centred ecological reform of the monetary system over local currencies. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
59. The Transition Movement: by Esther Alloun and Samuel Alexander. De-carbonisation is necessary and desirable for reasons of peak oil and climate change, and given how carbon-intensive global trade is, de-carbonisation implies re-localising economic processes. As well as this, a central goal of the movement is to build community resilience (the capacity to withstand shocks and the ability to adapt after disturbances). (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
60. Buen Vivir, Degrowth and Ecological Swaraj: Alternatives to sustainable development and the Green Economy by Ashish Kothari, Federico Demaria and Alberto Acosta discuss Buen Vivir from Latin America, Degrowth from Europe and Ecological Swaraj (or Radical Ecological Democracy) from India. The intention is to outline that there is politics beyond a unilinear future, unsustainable and unjust, consisting primarily of economic growth. (checked on 23 Dec. 2015)
61. Time to leave GDP behind: Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success. Countries should act now to embrace new metrics, urge Robert Costanza and colleagues. (checked on 18 Apr. 2016)
62. Beyond GDP: Measuring and achieving global genuine progress by Ida Kubiszewski, Robert Costanza, Carol Franco, Philip Lawn, John Talberth, Tim Jackson, and Camille Aylmer. While global Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has increased more than three-fold since 1950, economic welfare, as estimated by the Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI), has actually decreased since 1978. Although GPI is not the perfect economic welfare indicator, it is perhaps a far better approximation than GDP. Development policies need to shift to better account for real welfare and not merely GDP growth, according to the authors. (checked on 18 Apr. 2016)
63. Dutch city of Utrecht to experiment with a universal, unconditional ‘basic income’ : The experiment hopes to determine whether society works effectively with Basic Income which is a universal, unconditional form of payment to individuals that covers their living costs. The concept is to allow people to choose to work more flexible hours in a less regimented society, allowing more time for care, volunteering and study. The local university will help to establish whether ‘basic income’ can work in real life. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
64. Low-Carbon Development Pathways for a Sustainable India: This study provides an assessment of India’s economic development with decadal scenarios till 2050. It assesses India’s options on energy mix and CO2-emissions in two low-carbon scenarios emphasising on energy efficiency and renewable energy sources such as solar, wind, hydro and biomass. It is designed to lead to a wider discussion showing that India can achieve a low-carbon pathway without considerably decreasing its development ambitions.  (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)

65. Post-Growth Economics: A Paradigm Shift in Progress by Samuel Alexander, February 2014 (First Published in Post Carbon Pathways, Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute, Working Paper Series) (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)

66. Forget ‘developing’ poor countries, it’s time to ‘de-develop’ rich countries by Jason Hickel. How much do we really need to live long and happy lives? People sense there is something wrong with the dominant model of economic progress and they are hungry for an alternative narrative. It’s about reaching a higher level of understanding and consciousness about what we’re doing here and why. (checked on 12 Apr. 2017)
67. In the essay ‘Subsistence is resistance: Local food systems in times of economic crisis‘  author Leila Dregger discusses the situation in the largest and poorest region of Portugal. Small producers, bars, kitchens, shops and bakeries that make up traditional culture here are now illegal. They have protested, and there have been cases of civil disobedience, with customers continueing to use and defend local markets even in the face of criminalisation. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
68. The report Weaving the Communty Resilience and New Economy Movement: Voices and Reflections from the Field has been published by the Post Carbon Institute (website www.resilience.org) is about the Community Resilience & New Economy (CRNE) movement (based in the USA and Canada) which is a dynamic ecosystem in which organizations working on community-building, economic activity, advocacy and funding serve unique but  interdependent roles. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
69. The paper Third World Alternatives for Building Post-capitalist Worlds by David Barkin and Blanca Lemus introduces alternatives emerging from groups, whose organizations are shaped by different cosmologies, products of their multiple ethnic origins, and by the profound philosophic and epistemological debates among social movements proposing different strategies for achieving progress, improving well-being and conserving ecosystems. (checked on 4 Dec. 2017)
70. The paper Rethinking the Social and Solidarity Society in Light of Community Practice, by David Barkin and Blanca Lemus, offers an analysis of the ways in which peoples are mobilizing to build organizations and to define social movements to move beyond current crises. The lines for constructing an ecologically sound and social-solidarity society require mechanisms for mutual cooperation based on alternative systems of decision making, as well as for doing work and assuring well-being to every member of the community. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
71. The illiteracy of innovation written by Shiv Visvanathan. The author discusses how the formal economy and the scientific sector deal with advanced technology, while the informal, the world of biomass, craft societies, are treated as lesser worlds with a separate logic. It is a dualism of thought which is quietly destroying huge parts of our culture. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
72. In A-Meri-India: A Note from the Land of Frustrated Aspirants, the author Aseem Shrivastava analyses the state of the economy and society of India and states that the cultural confidence of our civilisation needs to be revived soon enough to not only protect India from the worst socio-ecological damages of breakneck globalisation, but also play the role of the world’s ecological pioneer, instead of the “superpower” it has somehow come to believe it is destined to become one day. (checked on 21 Jul. 2016)
73. Ruth Mwangi of Grassroots Economics Foundation is interviewed by Ashish Kothari on the path-breaking idea of “Community Currencies” and how it is being implemented in Kenya. (checked on 15 May 2018)
74. The making of an indigenous scanning tunneling microscope by Pankaj Sekhsaria looks at the making of cutting edge instruments in a physics lab in Pune but with concepts and methodologies associated very much with jugaad. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
75. A Report on the Symposium on “Growth, green growth or degrowth?: New critical directions for India’s sustainability”, which concludes that the concept of “degrowth” is relevant to many contemporary debates in India, in particular to the imminent peak of most key resources; and that Alternatives are already out there and should be encouraged, especially in the rural world. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
76. Why Europe needs community currencies: New ways to exchange time and goods, complementary currencies provide a valuable supplement to conventional money and the narrowly profit orientated economies it created. They allow people to build connections across their communities that don’t depend on Euros or Pounds. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
77. Open Cooperativism for the P2P Age – though traditional cooperatives have played an important and progressive role in human history, their format needs to be updated to the networked era by introducing peer-to-peer and commons producing aspects. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)

78. Fairness and the Commons, an Interview with Enric Duran, famous for his 2008 “bank action”, an act which involved defrauding 39 Spanish banks of nearly €500,000 and subsequently distributing these funds to a variety of activist movements and social causes. He is currently busy organizing the FairCoop Open Cooperative, a community-built effort to alleviate global economic inequalities through the use of mutual credit, reputation systems and cryptocurrencies. (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)

79. Gharats of Uttaranchal: Harnessing Natural Energy by Manikant Shah reports findings of a detailed study of this traditional water-driven flour mill technology: how it could bee upgraded to fit in with the modern times and requirements, as also for the benefit of the poor people of the Himalayan region. (checked on 30 May 2016)
80. In “Economic Democracy: An Ethically Desirable Socialism That Is Economically Viable” David Schweickart proposes an alternative political-economic system model that has neither capital markets nor labor markets in the usual sense. Workers would control their own jobs and workplaces, while productive resources would become the collective property of society and there would be social control over investment. (checked on 10 Jun. 2016)
81. In “Participatory Economics and the Next System” Robin Hahnel describes a model (developed together with Michael Albert) that revolves around (a) social ownership of the productive “commons,” (b) consumption rights based on effort and need, (c) and workplace councils and neighborhood consumer councils which coordinate their interrelated activities through participatory planning rather than through markets. (checked on 10 Jun. 2016)
82. In “Whole Systems Change: A Framework & First Steps for Social/Economic Transformation” Riane Eisler’s model places economic policies and practices in their larger social context, proposing two integrative social categories that go beyond religious vs. secular, capitalist vs. socialist, East vs. West, and so forth. It proposes an action plan to break with traditions of domination, identifies trends in this direction, and outlines four strategies to build the missing foundations for a more equitable and sustainable socio-economic system. (checked on 10 Jun. 2016)
83. In “Social Democracy: Not Socialism, and Coming to America” Lane Kenworthy proposes a model that closely resembles the actual political economies of the Scandinavian countries and has as its primary goals the full realization of economic security, equality (low inequality) of opportunity, and shared prosperity. It is in essence a market capitalist model with generous and employment-friendly social policy. (checked on 10 Jun. 2016)
84. In Radical Ecological Economics author David Barkin describes how Communities are realizing that they can be better off by taking control over their territories and organizing themselves collectively to assure the production of their needs and the conservation of their environments through direct democracy, based on a better understanding of social relations along with the connections between the economy, society and nature, placing power at the center of our analysis. (checked on 17 Nov. 2017)

85. Can we fix it? The repair cafes waging war on throwaway culture published by The Guardian. When fixing items is actively discouraged by manufacturers, recycling becomes a political act, say Repair Cafe volunteers. (checked on 20 Mar. 2018)

86. The EU needs a stability and wellbeing pact, not more growth – 238 academics call on the European Union and its member states to plan for a post-growth future in which human and ecological wellbeing is prioritised over GDP (checked on 17 Sep. 2018)

87. Gathering degrowth in the American pluriverse by Sam Bliss. Degrowth is a lot of things: a criticism, a proposal, a hypothesis, a provocation, a conversation, a deceleration, a downscaling, a reimagining, a project, a lens, a movement, a set of practices, an invitation to dream of worlds beyond growth. This is not disagreement about the definition of degrowth; it is evidence of the plurality of diverse meanings this potent word packs. (checked on 23 Oct. 2018)
88. Post-Capitalism by Design not Disaster by Samuel Alexander. Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute, Unoversity of Melbourne – Keynote address at the New Economy Network of Australia Conference. (checked on 26 Nov. 2018)
89. Clean energy won’t save us – only a new economic system can do that by Jason Hickel. The author analyses the uses we put energy to, and argues that it’s time to pour our creative power into imagining a new global economy – one that maximises human wellbeing while actively shrinking our ecological footprint. (checked on 18 Jul. 2016)
90. Degrowth: A Call for Radical Abundance by Jason Hickel. The author argues that by de-enclosing social goods and restoring the commons, we can ensure that people are able to access the things that they need to live a good life without having to generate piles of income in order to do so, and without feeding the never-ending growth machine. (checked on 11 Dec. 2018)
91. In Search of A Grown-up Economy by Katherine Trebeck and Jeremy Williams argues for developing countries learning from the failures of GDP-rich nations and bypassing them altogether – for example, building renewable energy, circular economy industries and employee ownership from the start. (checked on 12 Mar. 2019)

92. How recycled water could revolutionise sustainable development by Tamara Avellán – Collecting and exploiting waste water is both technically feasible and financially justifiable. The piece discusses utilising a “constructed wetland environment”. (checked on 22 Mar. 2019)

93. Economics for the People of a Living Earth – a working paper by David Korten. The spreading awareness that as more and more people compete for less and less in a world in which power and wealth are increasingly concentrated, humanity is on a path to self-extinction leads to a search for a new economics. The paper includes Defining Challenges for 21st Century Economics. (checked on 3 May 2019)
94. Women’s Co-Operatives: A Glimpse into Rojava’s Economic Model by Hawzhin Azeez on the networks of grassroots assemblies and co-operatives that the people of Rojava (western Kurdistan, North Syria) are carrying out is based on the radical model of Democratic Confederalism founded by the imprisoned Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan and inspired by the works of the US ecologist Murray Bookchin. (checked on 23 Sep. 2019)
95. Eight Principles of a New Economics for the People of a Living Earth by David Korten. There is a rising awareness of the need for a serious update to the economics that serves as our guide to structuring and managing the economy and preparing young people for their roles as future leaders. The principles for a reformed economic theory – to guide our path to a new economy for the 21st century – described here. (checked on 15 Jul. 2019)
96. Peasants Can Unite the Global South to Beat Back Food Shortages by S.P. Shukla explains the challenges of the new financial global order post the COVID 19 pandemic. For India and its present rulers, it should be a welcome opportunity to restore India’s traditional role of prominence among the nations of the South. It will be a win- win situation for Russia, China and India. (checked on 4th May. 2022)

Newsletters:

1. Mahua (Issue 1, Oct. 2020) – weaving together important conversations and initiatives around our ‘real economy’ both existing and emerging across the country. This newsletter has come out of keeping alive and pursuing conversations that were seeded at the ‘Alternative Economies Vikalp Sangam’ in January 2020.
2. “Geographies of degrowth: Nowtopias, resurgences and the decolonization of imaginaries and places” (5 articles) Edited by Federico Demaria, Giorgos Kallis and Karen Bakker. Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space. This Special Issue addresses the geographical aspects of degrowth, looking at the rooted experiences of peoples and collectives rebelling against, and experimenting with alternatives to, growth-based development. Authors approach such resurgent or ‘nowtopian’ efforts from a decolonial perspective, focusing on how they defend and produce new places, new subjectivities and new state relations. (checked on 12 Sep. 2019)
3. “Theoretical and political journeys between environmental justice and degrowth: what potential for an alliance?” (15 articles) Edited by Bengi Akbulut, Federico Demaria, Julien-Francois Gerber, Joan Martinez-Alier. Ecological Economics. Degrowth and environmental justice (EJ) movements have the best potential to interconnect. Authors argue that both degrowth and EJ movements are materialist but also more than just materialist in scope and both seek a politico-metabolic reconfiguration of our economies. (checked on 12 Sep. 2019)
4. Quarterly publication LETTERS (Oct. 2017) by the organisation (Self-Reliant Initiatives Through Joint Action (SRIJAN). It’s an effort to capture the vivid experiences of rural professionals working in the grassroots in a raw manner which will reflect their emotions, their thought process, their experiences in their own writings. (checked on 12 Nov. 2017)
5. Newsletters (in English, Français and Español) published on Ekta Parishad website (checked on 25 Jun. 2015)
6. International Journal of the Commons is an initiative of the International Association for the Study of the Commons (IASC). As an interdisciplinary peer-reviewed open-access journal, the IJC is dedicated to furthering the understanding of institutions for use and management of resources that are (or could be) enjoyed collectively. These resources may be part of the natural world (e.g. forests, climate systems, or the oceans) or they may emerge from social realities created by humans (e.g. the internet or (scientific) knowledge, for example of the sort that is published in open-access journals).  (checked on 24 Oct. 2017)
7. Leaf Litter – Special Edition of a newsletter put together by the NTFP-Exchange Programme in India.
8. The INSEE Journal is an open access, peer reviewed journal of Indian Society for Ecological Economics (INSEE), a registered society since 1999. EES offers authors a forum to address socio-environmental issues from, across and within the natural and social sciences, with an aim to promote methodological pluralism and inter-disciplinary research. (Checked on 12 Sep. 2021)