''Small Is Beautiful: A Study of Economics As If People Mattered'' is a collection of essays published in 1973 by German-born British economist E. F. Schumacher. The title "Small Is Beautiful" came from a principle espoused by Schumacher's teacher Leopold KohrDr. Leopold Kohr, 84; Backed Smaller States

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obituary, 28 February 1994. (1909–1994) advancing small,

appropriate technologies Appropriate technology is a movement (and its manifestations) encompassing technological choice and application that is small-scale, affordable by locals, decentralized, labor-intensive, energy-efficient, environmentally sustainable, and loca ...

, policies, and polities as a superior alternative to the mainstream ethos of "bigger is better". Overlapping environmental, social, and economic forces such as the 1973 energy crisis and popularisation of the concept of globalisation helped bring Schumacher's ''Small Is Beautiful'' critiques of mainstream economics to a wider audience during the 1970s. In 1995 ''The Times Literary Supplement'' ranked ''Small Is Beautiful'' among the 100 most influential books published since

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, October 6, 1995, p. 39 A further edition with commentaries was published in 1999. Schumacher, E. F.; ''Small Is Beautiful: Economics As If People Mattered : 25 Years Later...With Commentaries'' (1999). Hartley & Marks Publishers

Synopsis

''Small Is Beautiful'' is divided into four parts: "The Modern World", "Resources", "The Third World", and "Organization and Ownership". * Part I – summarizes the economic world of the early 1970s from Schumacher's perspective. In the first chapter, "The Problem of Production", Schumacher argues that the modern

economy An economy is an area of the production, distribution and trade, as well as consumption of goods and services. In general, it is defined as a social domain that emphasize the practices, discourses, and material expressions associated with t ...

is unsustainable.

Natural resources Natural resources are resources that are drawn from nature and used with few modifications. This includes the sources of valued characteristics such as commercial and industrial use, aesthetic value, scientific interest and cultural value. ...

(like fossil fuels), are treated as expendable

income Income is the consumption and saving opportunity gained by an entity within a specified timeframe, which is generally expressed in monetary terms. Income is difficult to define conceptually and the definition may be different across fields. F ...

, when in fact they should be treated as capital, since they are not renewable, and thus subject to eventual depletion. He further argues that nature's resistance to

pollution Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into the natural environment that cause adverse change. Pollution can take the form of any substance (solid, liquid, or gas) or energy (such as radioactivity, heat, sound, or light). Pollutants, the ...

is limited as well. He concludes that government effort must be concentrated on sustainable development, because relatively minor improvements, for example,

technology transfer Technology transfer (TT), also called transfer of technology (TOT), is the process of transferring (disseminating) technology from the person or organization that owns or holds it to another person or organization, in an attempt to transform invent ...

Third World The term "Third World" arose during the Cold War to define countries that remained non-aligned with either NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, ; french: Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord, ), also called the Nor ...

countries, will not solve the underlying problem of an unsustainable economy. Schumacher's philosophy is one of "enoughness", appreciating both human needs and limitations, and appropriate use of technology. It grew out of his study of village-based economics, which he later termed

Buddhist economics Buddhist economics is a spiritual and philosophical approach to the study of economics. It examines the psychology of the human mind and the emotions that direct economic activity, in particular concepts such as anxiety, aspirations and self-a ...

, which is the subject of the book's fourth chapter. * Part II – casts Education as the greatest resource, and discusses Land, Industry, Nuclear Energy and the human impact of Technology. * Part III – discusses the gap between the center of the

World System A world-system is a socioeconomic system, under systems theory, that encompasses part or all of the globe, detailing the aggregate structural result of the sum of the interactions between polities. World-systems are usually larger than single state ...

and the developing world as it existed then, with a focus on village culture and unemployment in India. * Part IV – presents a sketch of a Theory of Large Scale Organization, takes issue with platitudes about capitalism as a social order and discusses alternatives. Chapter 3 of this part concludes with advice to socialists:

"Socialists should insist on using the nationalised industries not simply to out-capitalise the capitalists – an attempt in which they may or may not succeed – but to evolve a more democratic and dignified system of industrial administration, a more humane employment of machinery, and a more intelligent utilization of the fruits of human ingenuity and effort. If they can do this, they have the future in their hands. If they cannot, they have nothing to offer that is worthy of the sweat of free-born men." (Part IV, Chapter 3 'Socialism')

References

External links

Full Text of ''Small is Beautiful''
at ditext.com
The Schumacher Institute for Sustainable Systems home page
{{Authority control 1973 non-fiction books Appropriate technology advocates Blond & Briggs books Environmental non-fiction books Simple living Sustainability books 1973 neologisms Quotations from literature

Synopsis

See also

References

External links