Buddhist Economics: An Enlightened Approach to the Dismal Science

by Clair Brown

Overview

In the tradition of E. F. Schumacher's Small Is Beautiful, renowned economist Clair Brown argues persuasively for a new economics built upon equality, sustainability, and right living.

"Buddhist Economics will give guidance to all those who seek peace, fairness, and environmental sustainability." -Jeffrey Sachs, author of The Age of Sustainable Development.

Traditional economics measures the ways in which we spend our income, but doesn't attribute worth to the crucial human interactions that give our lives meaning.

Clair Brown, an economics professor at U.C. Berkeley and a practicing Buddhist, has developed a holistic model, one based on the notion that quality of life should be measured by more than national income. Brown advocates an approach to organizing the economy that embraces rather than skirts questions of values, sustainability, and equity. Complementing the award-winning work of Jeffrey Sachs and Bill McKibben, and the paradigm-breaking spirit of Amartya Sen, Robert Reich, and Thomas Piketty, Brown incorporates the Buddhist emphasis on interdependence, shared prosperity, and happiness into her vision for a sustainable and compassionate world.

Buddhist economics leads us to think mindfully as we go about our daily activities, and offers a way to appreciate how our actions affect the well-being of those around us. By replacing the endless cycle of desire with more positive collective activities, we can make our lives more meaningful as well as happier. Inspired by the popular course Professor Brown teaches at U.C. Berkeley, Buddhist Economics represents an enlightened approach to our modern world infused with ancient wisdom, with benefits both personal and global, for generations to come.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781632863676
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication date:	02/21/2017
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	224
File size:	697 KB

About the Author

Clair Brown is a professor of economics and director of the Center for Work, Technology, and Society at the University of California, Berkeley. An economist focusing on work and economic justice, she is a past director of the Institute of International Relations at Berkeley, and chair of the Committee on Education Policy of the UCB Academic Senate. She lives in Richmond, CA.
Clair Brown is a Professor of Economics, and Director of the Center for Work, Technology, and Society at the University of California, Berkeley. An economist focusing on work and economic justice, she is a past Director of the Institute of International Relations at Berkeley, and Chair of the Committee on Education Policy of the UCB Academic Senate.

Editorial Reviews

12/12/2016
Brown, a University of California, Berkeley professor of economics, believes the primary concern of the free market is profit and prosperity, but such a gain must be weighed against the crises that it produces, including income inequality, climate damage, poverty, and overpopulation. For a country to be prosperous, she writes, it is commonly assumed that free market economics will provide the best outcome to its citizens. Buddhist economics, on the other hand, requires a different metric: shared prosperity through minimizing suffering and striving toward equality of well-being for all. Brown explains the Buddhist economic world as quasi-utopian: the end of poverty, universal healthcare, humane working conditions, proper recognition of human rights, efforts to stop and perhaps even reverse climate damage. Not to be written off as an idealist, she offers concrete suggestions for the implementation of a Buddhist economic program and metrics to assess progress towards equity and stability. Such suggestions include a redistribution of wealth in society (naturally, the rich must simplify and give up their luxuries), a restructuring of preexisting markets, and new regulations and taxes (such as carbon and pollution taxes). Though she treads familiar ground in her criticism of free market economics, Brown’s economic program is compelling and stimulating, asking readers to consider both how they contribute to contemporary conditions and how they can break out of them. Agent: Lisa Adams, Garamond Agency (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

"This book will both shake up one's worldview and help calm one's agitated soul. It's a reminder that 'economics' is infinitely more interesting than the reductionist kind we teach in universities, and that 'religion' has far more to offer our everyday lives than we sometimes imagine." - Bill McKibben, Author EAARTH and Founder 350.org

"An important and provocative book about where conventional economics goes wrong. As Clair Brown masterfully shows, a new and more sensible economics would focus on a sustainable environment, shared prosperity, and interdependence. Instead of being a dismal science, economics should be an inspiring story of how we can work together to improve the quality of life for all." - Robert B. Reich, Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy, University of California at Berkeley, and author of SAVING CAPITALISM

"Buddhist Economics will inspire people to seek a better and wiser use of society's know-how and resources. Brown declares her goal to 'expand the dialogue among people around the world who seek meaningful lives for all.' In this she succeeds splendidly." - Jeffrey D. Sachs, Special Advisor to the UN Secretary-General on the Millennium Development Goals, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University

"A long, long time ago Adam Smith demonstrated that the economy would work pretty well if everyone were selfish. But Clair Brown has done considerably better. Her perceptive, interesting, fun book, Buddhist Economics, demonstrates that we could be so much more well off in many different ways, if, instead, we were just nice. This book has important messages for everyone. I hope that it will be read by all economists, and also by everyone else." - George Akerlof, Nobel Laureate in Economics, 2001

"Revolutionary and urgently needed. This brilliant and beautifully argued book will not only change how you think about the most pressing problems that concern us all, it will inspire you to paths of action that lead to those problems' solutions. This is a game-changing read." - Dacher Keltner, author of THE POWER PARADOX

From the Publisher

2016-12-05
In a Hobbesian marketplace full of predators and lambs, an economist offers a case for being a little nicer—and more mindful. A primary tenet of Buddhism is that, given that all life involves suffering, we are at our best when minimizing another's travails. In the economic sense, this involves a chain of Pareto improvements—transactions, that is, in which everyone is left better off than before. That's the ideal, seldom realized. In Buddhist economics, one hopes for the same all-around benefit. To gauge how it works in a particular society, writes Brown (Director, Center for Work, Technology, and Society/Univ. of California), "we look at the distribution of well-being across its population, including equal access to opportunity." Such an economy hinges on a recognition of the primacy of public goods, including ready access to education and other human-capital resources, and it requires a full reckoning of what an economist would call externalities: the costs of pollution attendant in burning a gallon of gas. In this calculus, the old laws of supply and demand yield to a new understanding, to "new prices and outputs that reflect our new interdependent values." Naturally, such an understanding also involves a redistribution of wealth within Western economies and from richer to poorer countries, a kind of large-scale international socialism. Lest anyone dismiss Brown's program as pure pie in the sky—though there is that—she offers the example of the Buddhist country of Bhutan, which "introduced the idea of using a Gross National Happiness (GNH) index in place of GDP to measure the nation's prosperity and well-being." And with lessened suffering and a few more dollars in the pocket, why wouldn't one be measurably happier? Brown's portrait of an ideal market is speculative in the ordinary sense of the word, but, even if likely to be dismissed by the financier class, it makes for an attractive prospectus.

Kirkus Reviews