Module 1: What is a wellbeing economy?
What does wellbeing have to do with our economies?
So what does wellbeing have to do with our economies? Before we go into this question, let’s take a step back for a moment and reflect on what the economy actually is. Today, many of our institutions, policies, and narratives present the economy, society, and the environment as three - largely independent - pillars or domains, vying for resources and attention. This representation leads us to think about trade-offs and ‘externalities’ rather than synergies between economic, societal and environmental wellbeing.
Instead, a wellbeing economy starts from an embedded model of the economy. This embedded model recognises that, at its core, the economy is about the ways in which we care and provide for one another. The economy doesn’t exist independent of societies and the natural environment. It should serve social and environmental goals: providing all people and communities with their basic needs while respecting the environmental boundaries of our planet. In short, a wellbeing economy sees economic, societal and environmental wellbeing as an integrated system rather than a divisive set of priorities [1] [2] [3].
Kate Raworth introduces the embedded economy
As Kate Raworth describes in the video, in our day-to-day lives, the ‘economy’ has often become another word for ‘markets’. Yet, the market is just one of four segments of the economy. This overemphasis on markets when we speak about the economy - whether it is about inflation rates, supply and demand curves, recessions or rent increases - has made many of us feel like the economy is something technical that operates outside of our control and is ruled by complex mathematical formulas.
It is easy to forget that we, as humans, created the economic rules by which we play. As humans, we created the economy and we can therefore recreate it. Putting wellbeing at the heart of our economies is firstly about changing our understanding of the economy and our relationship to it, as the starting point for a new approach to its management and governance.
Have a go at exploring how the economy shows up in your life, by clicking on the Activity Card.
References
[1] Daly, H. E. (1973). Toward a steady-state economy. W.H.Freeman & Co Ltd.
[2] Raworth, K. (2017) Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist. Penguin Random House UK.
[3] Trebeck, K., & Williams, J. (2019). The Economics of Arrival: Ideas for a Grown-Up Economy. Policy Press.