Last weekend, at the University of Greenwich, over 40 speakers got together for a conference on rethinking economics and to reflect on why the demand for pluralism in economics is as urgent as ever.
Over two days nearly 300 people attended 20 student-led sessions, reflecting the key areas that students claim have been largely absent from mainstream economics education: ecological sustainability, inequality, gender relations, global capitalism and pluralism.
Rethinking Economics
Greenwich – the student society organising the conference – welcomed
top economists, central bankers, academics, civil servants
and activists who argued that in order to tackle the great
economic challenges of the 21st century we need a reformed
economics education that allows space for critical thinking, different
perspectives on real world economic issues and alternative
schools of thought.
The two keynote speeches of the conference hammered home the arguments of the
student movement.
Michael Kumhof, Senior Research Advisor in the Research Hub at the Bank of England, opened the conference, arguing that we need pluralist and interdisciplinary research in order to deal with the problems of the present and anticipating the problems of the future, highlighting several examples, including the lack of a proper understanding of energy in mainstream macroeconomics.
Alongside well renowned speakers such as Özlem Onaran and Denise Hawkes, both University of Greenwich, early-career scholars were given the opportunity to present their research, and activists from Positive Money and Rethinking Economics delivered workshops. Tomás Rotta, also University of Greenwich, presented The Oxford Handbook of Karl Marx which he had co-edited together with Matt Vidal.
Victoria Chick, distinguished Emeritus Professor at UCL, closed the conference with a passionate speech criticising the mainstream notion of pluralism as a mere add-on to dominant theory and encouraging what she called a 'truly radical' project.
Professor Chick was speaking together with Jakob Kapeller, Professor for Socioeconomics at the University Duisburg-Essen, Germany, who gave insights into analysing and practising pluralism in his own research. Following their outstanding speeches, Professor Chick and Professor Kapeller discussed students' priorities for curriculum change that had previously been developed in a students-only workshop.
Professor Denise Hawkes, Head of Department, said: "It is a pleasure to support our students in organising this conference which demonstrates the strength of our student voice and the value of our inclusive curriculum. I am delighted our students work in partnership with our academics to consider the relevance of the curriculum we teach."
Alongside the speakers, Rethinking Economics Greenwich welcomed student organisers from across the UK and beyond, including Italy, Austria, Germany, Hungary, Belgium and the Netherlands.
The full line up of speakers and programme is available here.
If you are interested in getting involved in rethinking economics Greenwich, please contact us on greenwich@rethinkeconomics.org
