IGP launches new book - Financing Prosperity by Dealing with Debt

This month, IGP celebrates the launch of Financing Prosperity by Dealing with Debt. The book draws together current thinking on how to solve debt crises and promote inclusive prosperity in an era when many of us depend on debt to survive but struggle with its consequences. It can be downloaded for free from the UCL Press website. 

By profiling existing action by credit unions and community organisations, alongside bold proposals for the future, with contributions from artists, activists and academics, the book shows how we can rethink the validity and inevitability of many contemporary forms of debt through organising debt audits, promoting debt cancellation and expanding member-owned co-operatives. The authors set out legal and political methods for changing the rules of the system to provide debt relief and reshape economies for more inclusive and sustainable flourishing. The book also profiles community-based actions that are changing the role of debt in economic, social and political life – among them, participatory art projects, radical advice networks and ways of financing feminist green transitions.

The book is edited by Dr Christopher Harker, Associate Professor in IGP and Dr Amy Horton, Lecturer in Economic Geography at UCL.

Financing Prosperity by Dealing with Debt is the first book in IGP's new Global Prosperity in Thought and Practice book series. This series introduces new methodological and theoretical approaches to engage with diverse ideas about what it means to live a prosperous life in different places and under varied conditions. The series draws together accounts of research and practice that build new pathways to a sustainable and prosperous global future. 

If you are interested in contributing a volume, please get in touch with the editors Dr Christopher Harker (christopher.harker@ucl.ac.uk) and Dr Yuan He (yuan.he@ucl.ac.uk).

Image credit: Graeme Truby of Bank Job Pictures