Liberals worldwide invoke Scandinavia as a promised land of equality, while most conservatives fear it as a hotbed of liberty-threatening socialism. But the left and right can usually agree on one thing: that the Nordic system is impossible to replicate elsewhere. The US and UK are too big, or too individualistic, or too . . . something. In Viking Economics George Lakey dispels these myths. He explores the inner workings of the Nordic economies that boast the world’s happiest, most productive workers, and explains how we can enact some of the changes—including universal healthcare, affordable childcare, and a month of paid vacation for all—that the Scandinavians fought for surprisingly recently. We, too, can refuse to be governed by the elites and embrace equality in our economic policy—here’s how.

""Viking History"" explores the profound impact of Scandinavian seafarers on European history, challenging the notion of Vikings as mere raiders. The book delves into the socio-economic factors driving Viking expansion, their technological advancements in naval engineering, and the cultural influence of their settlements across Europe. It presents a nuanced view of Viking society, portraying them as complex traders, settlers, and explorers who shaped the medieval world. The narrative unfolds chronologically, from the first recorded Viking raid in 793 CE to the Norman Conquest of England in 1066. Along the way, readers discover intriguing facts about Viking life, such as their skilled craftsmanship and the role of women in Norse society. The book draws on diverse evidence, including archaeological findings and contemporary chronicles, to support its arguments. It also makes interdisciplinary connections, examining how climate change influenced Viking expansion and the lasting impact of Old Norse on European languages. What sets this work apart is its holistic approach, offering fresh insights that challenge popular misconceptions about the Viking Age. By balancing academic rigor with engaging storytelling, ""Viking History"" appeals to both general readers and students of medieval history, providing a comprehensive understanding of the Vikings' lasting legacy on European culture and warfare.

A cutting-edge, solutions-oriented analysis of how we can reimagine cities around the world to build sustainable futures. What would it take to make urban places greener, more affordable, more equitable, and healthier for everyone? In recent years, cities have stepped up efforts to address climate and sustainability crises. But progress has not been fast enough or gone deep enough. If communities are to thrive in the future, we need to quickly imagine and implement an entirely new approach to urban development: one that is centered on equity and rethinks social, political, and economic systems as well as urban designs. With attention to this need for structural change, Reimagining Sustainable Cities advocates for a community-informed model of racially, economically, and socially just cities and regions. The book aims to rethink urban sustainability for a new era. In Reimagining Sustainable Cities, Stephen M. Wheeler and Christina D. Rosan ask big-picture questions of interest to readers worldwide: How do we get to carbon neutrality? How do we adapt to a climate-changed world? How can we create affordable, inclusive, and equitable cities? While many books dwell on the analysis of problems, Reimagining Sustainable Cities prioritizes solutions-oriented thinking—surveying historical trends, providing examples of constructive action worldwide, and outlining alternative problem-solving strategies. Wheeler and Rosan use a social ecology lens and draw perspectives from multiple disciplines. Positive, readable, and constructive in tone, Reimagining Sustainable Cities identifies actions ranging from urban design to institutional restructuring that can bring about fundamental change and prepare us for the challenges ahead.

The personal is not only political, it’s also economic and sexual: as a society, we’re encouraged to view economics as objective science far removed from us—when in reality it has concrete and far-reaching effects on our everyday lives. In Screwnomics, Rickey Gard Diamond shares personal stories, cartoons, and easy-to-understand economic definitions in her quest to explain the unspoken assumptions of 300 years of EconoMansplaining—the economic theory that women should always work for less, or better for free. It unpacks economic definitions, turns a men-only history on its head, and highlights female experiences and solutions. encouraging female readers to think about their own economic memoir and confront our system’s hyper-masculine identity. In the past fifty years, the US has witnessed a major shift in economic theory, and yet few women can identify or talk about its influence in their own lives. Accessible and inspiring, Screwnomics offers female readers hope for a better, more inclusive future—and the tools to make that hope a reality.

This book presents the Metaeconomics Framework and Dual Interest Theory, which weave the empathy-based moral and ethical dimension back into key economic questions. Metaeconomics addresses the problem of placing too much emphasis on the market or the government, and thus argues that seeing the link between ego and empathy, self- and other-interest, and market and government will lead to a more just, fair, and sustainable polity. The unique Dual Interest Theory proposes that ego-based self-interest and empathy-based other-interest are joint and internal to each person: it maintains the original proposition from Adam Smith that each person maximizes their own-interest, which Metaeconomics makes clear involves balancing the two joint interests, although self-interest is more primal. The book begins with an explanation of how Metaeconomics connects the other kinds of economics. The book then provides a series of applications of Metaeconomics in heated policy issues, such as elections, finance, family, food, health, natural resources, education, taxes, and extreme inequality, among others. Finally, the book concludes that the only way to save capitalism is to bring empathy into both private and public actions and bring about a more humane balance in market and government.

Andrei Znamenski argues that socialism arose out of activities of secularized apocalyptic sects, the Enlightenment tradition, and dislocations produced by the Industrial Revolution. He examines how, by the 1850s, Marx and Engels made the socialist creed “scientific” by linking it to “history laws” and inventing the proletariat—the “chosen people” that were to redeem the world from oppression. Focusing on the fractions between social democracy and communism, Znamenski explores why, historically, socialism became associated with social engineering and centralized planning. He explains the rise of the New Left in the 1960s and its role in fostering the cultural left that came to privilege race and identity over class. Exploring the global retreat of the left in the 1980s–1990s and the “great neoliberalism scare,” Znamenski also analyzes the subsequent renaissance of socialism in wake of the 2007–2008 crisis.

This book examines how the two educational systems of China and the Nordic countries intersect. Over the past decade, there has been increased growth and interaction between China and the Nordic countries due to both government encouragement and academic curiosity. This book rejects a simplistic approach that presents both spaces as culturally uniform, confronting ‘East’ and ‘West’ entities, and suggests a comparative and contrastive approach that is critical and reflexive in both theory and methodology. This does not solely concentrate on difference, but emphasises similarities, including studies on philosophical, conceptual and methodological issues. This nuanced edited collection will appeal to students and scholars of Nordic and Chinese education as well as globalisation and interculturality.

Be Free Or Not Be Free is a discourse on the socialist freedom and how freedom in some socialist countries is really exercised. It discusses many freedoms that socialism and the socialists often address to the people: Freedom from Exploitations, Freedom from Oppressions, Freedom from Economic Deprivations, Freedom from Inequalities, Freedom from Many Burdens, Freedom from Unhappiness, Freedom from Nightmares, and Freedom from Captivities. Readers would discover that those promises of freedom are highly exalted and presented by the socialist leaders, yet in reality, people in socialist countries could hardly enjoy those freedoms but they would see and experience corruptions through social ownership, suppressions through big government, economic deprivations through wealth distributions, and inequalities through egalitarian society. They also see many distortions, evil, abuses of power and limited freedom Be Free Or Not Be Free also reveals that the Scandinavian countries are not the socialist countries but they are the strong democratic countries with high tax, high value of labor, and strong free market enterprises. It is not the socialist economic system but the capitalist economic operation that brings about the economic prosperity and great social welfares to the citizens of these Scandinavian countries. Be Free Or Not Be Free also discusses the attempts of many democrats, leftists and socialists in trying to deny the Christian faith, Christian contributions, Christian practices and Christian influences and how President Donald J. Trump and his Administration turns the situations around as they try to repeal the Johnson’s Amendment, remove taxpayers’ mondy from funding abortions by Planned Parenthood, and restore many Christian practices in public.

Filling a gap in the literature for an academically oriented volume on the Viking period, this unique book is a one-stop authoritative introduction to all the latest research in the field, and the most comprehensive book of its kind ever attempted.

If money troubles your soul, try this down-to-earth Quaker perspective on economies large and small. The economy, as we usually encounter it, has nothing to do with values or faith. After all, the “invisible hand” caters to no religious belief. It is all a matter of science, we are assured: economists have mastered the mathematical formulas for growth and prosperity. Our role as individuals is simply to work, consume and save, each adding our bit to the sum totals of economic activity that will keep the system humming along; the experts will take care of everything else. This breezy values-free story, however, is unlikely to be a comfortable fit for anyone who takes seriously the challenge of bringing our faith into the world. Knotty issues around economics crop up at every turn, especially if we are willing to ask the big questions: What is the economy for? How much is enough? What needs to be equal? How is well-being best measured? Who should decide? In Money and Soul this search for answers, through a Quaker lens, gives a taste of the power of applying faith values to our economic story.