Ecological Economics: Denise Hearn | GP Interview #12
This is the twelvth in a series of written interviews with thinkers, artists, activists and other luminaries around the world, people whose life’s work resonates with our founding principles.
Our friend Denise Hearn is an advisor, author, and speaker who works with organizations, asset managers, and companies who want to use their resources to support a more equitable future.
She is co-author of The Myth of Capitalism: Monopolies and the Death of Competition — named one of the Financial Times’ Best Books of 2018 and endorsed by two Nobel Prize winners. Her writing has been featured in publications like the Financial Times, Quartz, The Globe and Mail, and The Washington Post.
Denise and I recently met through our friend Yarrow Kraner and the Hatch Global Living Room forum.
GP: What is emergence theory and how does this relate to economics?
DH: Emergence theory is part of complexity theory. Emergent phenomena exhibit properties unique in combination that their component elements do not display in isolation (like human consciousness, ant colonies, or starling murmurations). Important elements of emergent phenomena are that they are: non-linear, self-organizing, and they evolve in an open-ended way…
