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  • Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist

  • Written by: Kate Raworth
  • Narrated by: Kate Raworth
  • Length: 10 hrs and 49 mins
  • 4.6 out of 5 stars (84 ratings)

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Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist

Written by: Kate Raworth
Narrated by: Kate Raworth
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Publisher's Summary

Economics is the mother tongue of public policy. It dominates our decision-making for the future, guides multi-billion-dollar investments, and shapes our responses to climate change, inequality, and other environmental and social challenges that define our times.

Pity then, or more like disaster, that its fundamental ideas are centuries out of date yet are still taught in college courses worldwide and still used to address critical issues in government and business alike. That's why it is time, says renegade economist Kate Raworth, to revise our economic thinking for the 21st century. In Doughnut Economics, she sets out seven key ways to fundamentally reframe our understanding of what economics is and does. Along the way, she points out how we can break our addiction to growth; redesign money, finance, and business to be in service to people; and create economies that are regenerative and distributive by design.

Named after the now-iconic "doughnut" image that Raworth first drew to depict a sweet spot of human prosperity (an image that appealed to the Occupy Movement, the United Nations, eco-activists, and business leaders alike), Doughnut Economics offers a radically new compass for guiding global development, government policy, and corporate strategy, and sets new standards for what economic success looks like.

Raworth handpicks the best emergent ideas - from ecological, behavioral, feminist, and institutional economics to complexity thinking and Earth-systems science - to address this question: How can we turn economies that need to grow, whether or not they make us thrive, into economies that make us thrive, whether or not they grow?

Simple, playful, and eloquent, Doughnut Economics offers game-changing analysis and inspiration for a new generation of economic thinkers.

©2017 Kate Raworth (P)2017 Chelsea Green Publishing

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Economics as a tool to balance global human impact?

When Kate Raworth first sought to study economics she despaired at the misguided dysfunction of what our financial systems had become. I am inspired that she recognized the disease we call “growth” as an obstacle to the thriveable future we all desire and came back with remedies and, if enough people subscribe to her model of Doughnut Economics (aka growth-agnostic economics) we will certainly develop the cure.

As a vegan I see (in ways that many do not) the interconnected impacts of animal agriculture and the pressures on the 9 planetary boundaries that make that industry the greatest obstacle to finding the “safe living space for humanity.” I was encouraged to hear Raworth in the “What Possibly Could Go Right?” podcast that she found her personal transition to veganism logical and quite easy.

It is always a deeper experience to hear an author voice their own audiobook. Raworth gave life to her own words (she began her “About the author” with “Kate Raworth — that’s me! —“). Her rational tone motivates me to share her message, ESPECIALLY on audiobook.

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Excellent book for people who care about how economics, social justice and environmental sustainability are related

As someone with a PhD in economics who never felt comfortable with the fundamental assumptions of the field, and who cares about social justice and the environment, I found this book illuminating and inspiring. Kate Raworth gives what seems to me a good account of where standard economic theory went wrong and how problematic its policy prescriptions are, given the combination of growing economic inequality and environmental degradation we see all around us. She is a gifted teacher, providing many telling illustrations, such as the “cuckoo bird of GDP growth”, and also many interesting examples. She reads the book herself and does so in a very engaging way that makes you wish you had her as a teacher.

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A history lesson on how we ended up here

This book was a great read for those seeking a better way forward. An economic engine to back the better way. However, most of the book was a (albeit fascinating) history lesson on how we got to where we are now with GDP as our main mechanism among other beliefs in the economics community. The very end of the book spends only a few minutes explaining the doughnut theory. I wish she had spent more time there. Next book?

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The economics book everyone needs to read

This book provides an overview of what’s wrong with the current mainstream economic system and what the solutions could look like (including many real world examples). And it does all this while remaining interesting and relatable. No background of economic study necessary.

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different way to view the world

This book made me think of our world in a totally different way. Much to think about regarding the plane landing.

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good ideas

the message was ok, but it was too academic. some interesting thoughts but still far from reality.

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exactly what you need to hear

loved it! I'm greatful for economists like Kate who are being the real superheroes of our planet.

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  • LAM X LUU
  • 2018-04-05

Economic romanticizing, not economic thinking

This book is not a true economic book. This is more of a "let's diss the current economics major, then try and fail to write a novel about how it should be." Its promises are big, but its solutions are inadequate at best.

First, the book brought up quite a few good points about the current politics of Economics. Economics is not really wrong (it's like "is Physics wrong?"), but its applications and moods can be. The book, though, makes no difference. Which, IMHO as an engineer, invalidates about 98% of the content. Look, if a person drives carelessly and causes accident, do you go and sue the car maker? That's idiotic!

Second, the premise of the book is non-scientific, non-mathematical. The author was correct: the economic diagrams are powerful because they are intuitive. But that conclusion is incomplete. The economic diagrams are powerful because they are intuitive MATH. They have real numbers to back up their intuition. The "doughnut," on the other hand, is pure hunch. I mean, nothing wrong with that, but you can't solve (economic) issues merely with hunches. You need NUMBERS to back it up.

For example, the doughnut implies 2 dimensions. What are these? None. It's pure fantasy! Furthermore, the dimensions applicable to the inner circles (of human needs) are not directly related to dimensions applicable to outer circles (of natural limits). For example, carbon emission impacts nature, but humans don't cloth or eat carbon emission! You can't put them on the same graph, for Newton's sake! (another criticism: it's not that we are in the inside space or out of the doughnut; we are in both; that's the problem; the doughnut does nothing to show that).

Thirdly, the books don't flow. Look above for the doughnut stupidity (seriously; don't pretend you are doing economics/math when you are writing novels). The whole thing about cast in the economy also doesn't flow. For example, "the nature is life-giving, so respect its boundaries." Huh? According to Christianity, God is life giving, and God has no such things as limit. Life-giving is unrelated to boundaries! Similarly, the "market is powerful, so embed it wisely" makes no sense. Power has nothing to do with embedding! I mean, King Kong is powerful, where do you embed it?

I mean, the author clearly has good intentions. She may or may not have good solutions. If she does, though, this book is clearly not it.

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  • Liz Lem
  • 2018-08-20

Healthy doughnut encounter!

When I recommend it to my friends the basic response is “ You had me at doughnuts but you lost me at economics.” The doughnut, even though it’s got a tasty name, is too complex for most people. I understand much of what she’s talking about because I spent my career in asset management. We need more people to understand economics and many more to understand it from a doughnut perspective. I wish she gave more examples of how to not just think but to act like a 21st Century economist. I would recommend this book to anyone who knows a little about economics, who is a progressive citizen and who wants humanity to live on a hospitable planet for centuries to come.

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  • Kit. Webster
  • 2018-07-17

Read this flawed book

Read the book to be challenged and to be exposed to creative thinking.

However, you are going to have to navigate falsehoods, straw men and IMHO fundamental misunderstandings along the way.

If you can ignore some basic flaws and contemplate the higher-level points, you will be challenged.

And that is a good thing.

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  • Patrick G
  • 2018-04-05

Thought Provoking

Very thought provoking with her unique approach to modern day economics. Some areas seem a bit idealistic, but interesting nonetheless. Definitely recommend this read!

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  • B. Landis
  • 2018-02-28

Finally, some sanity

I've never been able to stomach reading economics, because it seemed insane to me. Everything I'd seen required me to pretend that the Earth was limitless. I'm refreshed to find an economic text that addresses this issue, as well as human flourishing, in it's pages.

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  • Shawn Oueinsteen
  • 2019-02-14

How to Change Economics to Fix the Woy

Raworth argues that classical economics is wrong and if it were done correctly, we could fix many of the world's problems. She is very persuasive, but it seems she is fighting an uphill battle. She reads her book like an audio artist, and she has a great accent.

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  • Emilie Mesnier
  • 2019-06-16

Finally a book focused on a global solution

I have been worried about climate change, wealth inequalities (and the gap growing), rich countries exploiting poor ones, animal welfare, and the race to bigger companies, bigger economies, bigger profits (at all costs). it's been hard to engage in meaningful discussions with friends and acquaintances because I always felt I didn't have enough data on hand, and not a lot to propose as a potential solution. this book is the answer to all my wishes. so grateful someone spent their life studying these important issues, and took the time & effort to summarize it in a book. wow.

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  • Petri J.
  • 2019-02-20

Get to the point!

I will return this book because the author seems to talk about everything else but the seven ways to think like 21st-century economist. For example instead of just saying that the author created a diagram in the shape of a donut to illustrate the idea, the author goes to endless branches of description about images and why to use images and how images form in the brain and so on... these branches are completely unrelated to the topic of the book and offer endless hours of empty filler for subjects that everybody already knows.

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  • PimpMacDaddyBoy
  • 2019-01-30

Worth Listening to if You Are Interested in Economics, Social Welfare, Development, or Environmental Policy

I felt like the book started out a bit slow, but it was definitely interesting once it started flowing.

At times, it seemed like there was a lot of information being relayed without anything really being said. However, overall there were plenty of important points being made.

The data, studies, and views mentioned are great for challenging what has become accepted as “the way things are done,” and more work like this will be crucial to balancing the world in the coming decades.

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  • C. Jack Martin
  • 2021-11-07

Not Good Economic Analysis

Honest to god I don’t know where to start on how awfully inaccurate this book is, how it misinterprets the free market and effectively every single principle relating to the free market.

It is a (audio)book filled with only strawman arguments and looking at the comments of the people who love this book, it’s obvious they don’t know they are being shown strawman arguments and will take everything of Raworth’s book at her word.

Misleading is what this book is and I hope it’s influence is greatly reduced.

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