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Where do we go from here?

The markets have ruled for a third of a century, but it has all ended in tears. A return to selfish nationalism is possible. If we are to avoid this sombre outcome, we must find ways to rub the rough edges off globalisation

By Robert Skidelsky  
January 17, 2009
January 2009

Any great failure should force us to rethink. The present economic crisis is a great failure of the market system. As George Soros has rightly pointed out, “the salient feature of the current financial crisis is that it was not caused by some external shock like Opec… the crisis was generated by the system itself.” It originated in the US, the heart of the world’s financial system and the source of much of its financial innovation. That is why the crisis is global, and is indeed a crisis of globalisation.

There were three kinds of failure. The first, discussed by…

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Robert Skidelsky

Robert Skidelsky is the author of John Maynard Keynes 1883-1946: Economist, Philosopher, Statesman (Pan)

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