Cycles, Crises, Innovation

Book excerpt: 'Reflection on the "history of opinion", and its application to our contemporary world and controversies over technology and our environmental difficulties, is the distinguishing feature of the thoughtful economist. If the reader of this book is moved to reflect on the work of Schumpeter and Kalecki, the author of this book will have succeeded. Even more important than this, if the reader of this book comes to a changed and deeper understanding of how technology changes in our faltering capitalist economies, and of how the environment is affected by production and may be improved with better ways of satisfying our personal and productive needs, then the author will have done an even greater service to his profession and humanity.' From the foreword by Jan Toporowski, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, UK 'Jerry Courvisanos provides us with a timely analysis of the forces behind the crises of capitalism and the tendency towards ecologically unsustainable growth. He draws on the work of two of most creative, if not most recognized, economists of the 20th Century, Michal Kalecki and Joseph Schumpeter. In place of mainstream analysis with its emphasis on marginal conditions for optimisation around well-defined equilibrium, we have a world of innovation, structural change, creative destruction, business cycles, financial crises, changing income distribution and many other inconvenient developments that plague modern economies.' From the foreword by Harry Bloch, Curtin University, Australia Cycles, crises and innovation are the major economic forces that shape capitalist economies. Using a critical realist political economy approach, the analysis in this fine work is based on the works of Micha Kalecki and Joseph Schumpeter both of whom identify these three dynamic forces as plotting the path of economic development. Jerry Courvisanos' thought-provoking book examines how the rise of capital through investment enshrines innovation in profit and power which in turn determines the course of cycles and crises. The author concludes by arguing for strategic intervention by transformative eco-innovation as a public policy path to ecologically sustainable development. This interdisciplinary book will appeal to economists, innovation and entrepreneurship-based scholars, postgraduate students studying the political economy of both innovation and entrepreneurship, regional development planners and economic development policymakers. Anyone with a general interest in economics, politics and innovation or looking for a path out of the economic and ecological morass of current capitalism, will also find much to interest them in this book.