Reflection on Competing Wisdoms
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both the theoretical foundations of market economics and empirical experience ^ which contrary to the claims of the conventional wisdom strongly favours the alternative wisdom. Indeed, the conventional wisdom may itself be the single greatest barrier we face to progress toward sustainability.
Notes
1 Originally prepared for the Office of TechnologyAssessment, United States Congress,Washington, DC, November 1993.
Reflection on Competing Wisdoms
DAVID C. KORTEN
ABSTRACT In 1993, David C. Korten contrasted the key elements of an emergent alternative wisdom on sustainable development that was then emerging from a global citizen dialogue with the conventional wisdom of mainstream economists and the institutions of what we now know as the Washington consensus. Disregarding evidence that policies grounded in the conventional wisdom are devastating the environment and increasing the gap between the super rich and the desperately poor, the alternative wisdom has not gained a consequential foothold within the establishment even to this day. The alternative wisdom has, however, given birth to Ecological Economics as a new economics discipline and to global civil society as an increasingly powerful social force that is beginning to align global politics behind a new social and environmental vision. KEYWORDS sustainable development; Washington Consensus; trade agreements; global civil society; inequality; empire; economic alternatives
Introduction I originally wrote ‘Sustainable Development: Conventional versus Emergent Alternative Wisdom’ in November 1993 as a technical report for a consultancy with the Office of Technology Assess-
ment (OTA) of the US Congress.1 I had all but forgotten about the piece when Wendy Harcourt asked my permission a few months ago to reprint it in Development and invited me to write a reflective commentary to provide historical context.
Development (2005) 48(1), 69–74. doi:10.1057/palgrave.development.1100126
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Development 48(1): Dialogue What the report describes as Conventional Wisdom is now commonly referred to as neo-liberalism or the Washington Consensus. Officially embraced by the ultra-conservative administrations of Ronald Reagan in the United States and Margaret Thatcher in the United Kingdom in the early 1980s it became the defining framework of an aggressive programme of policy initiatives aimed at freeing global corporations and financial markets from public accountability at home and abroad. The devastating consequences in turn gave rise to an increasingly powerful social movement now known as global civil society that is steadfastly resisting the neo-liberal agenda while advancing a profound planetary transformation of human culture and institutions grounded in the Alternative Wisdom.
Neo-liberal agenda By 1982, it had become evident that many low-income countries would never be able to repay their accumulated foreign debts. Fear that default could bring a collapse of the global financial system spread panic in the ranks of global financiers. The Reagan administration embr
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