Sustainable Society

Towards the end of his life, Rudolf Steiner devoted some serious thought to relationship between politics, economics and culture. His thinking on agriculture has been more influential, but this book redresses the balance by looking at this in a wider context. It covers money, labour and income, land, capital, agriculture and democracy in a series of chapters also containing practical examples of how transformation can happen on the ground. The chapter on money explains the interesting distinction between purchase money, loan money (created by banks) and gift money, each of which has a different function. Although reform of the monetary system is important (the work of Bernard Lietaer is cited) it is not enough to remedy the whole economy. In the section on Labour and income, there are some very interesting models of reciprocity and mutuality that go beyond existing market arrangements and which are organised for the good of all members of the community in accordance with their needs. This is followed up in the chapter on the administration of land by the cultural sphere as in the Buschberghof farm consisting of 92 families. Modern agriculture considers itself as an industry, but Steiner shows how this is not in fact the case as the basic capital of soil can be consistently improved rather than depleted. It is easy to forget that agriculture is in fact our primary form of production and its contrast with industry is illustrated in a neat chart (p. 150). Although it is unlikely that the kind of approach advocated will be adopted on a wide scale, it is already evident that it can work at a local level. The book will be of particular interest to economists rethinking their subject from a new set of basic principles.