The New Economy Coalition (NEC) is an American nonprofit organization based in

Boston, Massachusetts Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...

, formerly known as the New Economics Institute. It is a network of over 200 organizations based in the US and Canada working for "a future where people, communities, and ecosystems thrive...where capital (wealth and the means of creating it) is a tool of the people, not the other way around" as part of what it describes as the New Economy movement.

History

New Economics Institute

Shortly after the start of the

2008 financial crisis The 2008 financial crisis, also known as the global financial crisis (GFC), was a major worldwide financial crisis centered in the United States. The causes of the 2008 crisis included excessive speculation on housing values by both homeowners ...

, leaders from both ''

New Economics Foundation The New Economics Foundation (NEF) is a Great Britain, British think-tank that promotes "social, economic and environmental justice". NEF was founded in 1986 by the leaders of The Other Economic Summit (TOES) with the aim of working for a "new m ...

'' (NEF) and the E. F. Schumacher Society recognized the need for an organization that could help bring systemic economic alternatives into the mainstream in North America. They collaborated to create a new organization called the New Economics Institute.

New Economics Network

The New Economics Network was created by Sarah Stranahan in 2009 as a loose network of about two hundred organizations working for the

new economy The New Economy refers to the ongoing development of the American economic system. It evolved from the notions of the classical economy via the transition from a manufacturing-based economy to a service-based economy, and has been driven by ...

. In a lecture for the

National Council for Science and the Environment The National Council for Science and the Environment (NCSE) is a U.S.-based nonpartisan, non-profit organization which has a mission to improve the scientific Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the for ...

Gus Speth said the organisation wanted to create a sustainable and caring economy.

Rename and merger

In March 2012, Bob Massie became the president of the New Economics Institute. In 2013, the New Economics Institute merged with the New Economy Network and became the New Economy Coalition. Also in that year, Dave Pruett writing for the

Huffington Post ''HuffPost'' (''The Huffington Post'' until 2017, itself often abbreviated as ''HPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and covers ...

described the organization as one of two ''"leading the way toward economic viability"''. Massie stepped down from being the coalition's president in October 2014. Farhad Ebrahimi served as intern director until May 2015 when Jonathan Rosenthal, a co-founder of the worker cooperative Equal Exchange was hired by a board and staff committee.

Policy

New Economy movement

The New Economy movement is often referred to as just 'new economy'. Proponents of the theory claim that it is based on the assumption that people and the planet should come first, and that it is human well-being, not economic growth, which should be prioritized. It draws on an aggregate of alternative economic thought that challenges the fundamental assumptions of mainstream neoclassical and

Keynesian economics Keynesian economics ( ; sometimes Keynesianism, named after British economist John Maynard Keynes) are the various macroeconomics, macroeconomic theories and Economic model, models of how aggregate demand (total spending in the economy) strongl ...

. Some of the approaches it includes are:

ecological economics Ecological economics, bioeconomics, ecolonomy, eco-economics, or ecol-econ is both a transdisciplinary and an interdisciplinary field of academic research addressing the interdependence and coevolution of human economy, economies and natural ec ...

solidarity economy Solidarity economy or social and solidarity economy (SSE) refers to a wide range of economic activities that aim to prioritize social profitability instead of purely financial profits. A key feature that distinguishes solidarity economy entities ...

commons The commons is the cultural and natural resources accessible to all members of a society, including natural materials such as air, water, and a habitable Earth. These resources are held in common even when owned privately or publicly. Commons ...

degrowth Degrowth is an Academic research, academic and social Social movement, movement critical of the concept of economic growth, growth in Real gross domestic product, gross domestic product as a measure of Human development (economics), human and econ ...

regenerative design Regenerative design is about designing systems and solutions that work with or mimic the ways that natural ecosystems return energy from less usable forms to more usable forms. Regenerative design uses systems thinking and other approaches to cre ...

systems thinking Systems thinking is a way of making sense of the complexity of the world by looking at it in terms of wholes and relationships rather than by splitting it down into its parts.Anderson, Virginia, & Johnson, Lauren (1997). ''Systems Thinking Ba ...

and

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 ...

Gar Alperovitz Gar Alperovitz (born May 5, 1936) is an American historian and political economist. Alperovitz served as a fellow of King's College, Cambridge; a founding fellow of the Harvard Institute of Politics; a founding Fellow at the Institute for Poli ...

described the New Economy movement as ''“... a far-ranging coming together of organizations, projects, activists, theorists and ordinary citizens committed to rebuilding the American political-economic system from the ground up."'' In 2009, Sarah van Gelder wrote, ''“The new economy is about increasing quality of life, improving health, and restoring the environment."''

Focus

The NEC focuses on issues in the United States and Canada and organizes there, although it does work in partnership with similar networks around the world. Writing for ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'' Jo Confino noted the NEC's approach of getting organizations to work together that share common aims if not strategies.

Work

New economy movement advocacy

The New Economy Coalition works to connect and promote its member organizations and the broader New Economy movement through online infrastructure, leadership development, strategic communications, granting programs, national conferences, and more.

Conferences

Strategies for a New Economy Conference

The New Economy Coalition hosted a conference entitled "Strategies for a New Economy" as a convening summit for diverse economic reformation efforts. The conference was held from June 8–10, 2012 at Bard College in New York. The conference featured workshops, strategizing sessions and lectures. More than 500 people were in attendance, representing over 300 organizations.

CommonBound 2014

In June 2014 the CommonBound conference brought together movement leaders, activists and practitioners.

Nathan Schneider Nathan Schneider (born 1984) is an American scholar and former journalist, who specializes in economic justice in the online economy. Since 2015, he has been a professor of media studies at the University of Colorado Boulder. Writing on relig ...

writing for

Al Jazeera Al Jazeera Media Network (AJMN; , ) is a private-media conglomerate headquartered in Wadi Al Sail, Doha, funded in part by the government of Qatar. The network's flagship channels include Al Jazeera Arabic and Al Jazeera English, which pro ...

saw the conference as part of a wider

movement.

= CommonBound 2016

= In July 2016 the New Economy Coalition, in partnership with the Crossroads Collaborative, brought together over 900 movement leaders, activists and practitioners in

Buffalo, NY Buffalo is a city in the U.S. state of New York and county seat of Erie County. It lies in Western New York at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of the Niagara River on the Canadian border. With a population of 278,349 according to ...

References

External links

*
The Global Transition to a New Economy map
{{Authority control Political and economic think tanks in the United States