The financial crisis and the 'great recession' have generated the need for new thinking in economics and for new economic policies to secure sustainable and equitable economic development. The new thinking in economics is an interdisciplinary approach to economic problems that acknowledges and respects insights and analyses from other disciplines, and recognizes complexity and evolutionary theory as relevant for understanding economic systems and economic behaviour. New Economics is concerned with institutional behaviour, expectations and uncertainty as opposed to traditional economics with its emphasis on equilibrium, mathematical formalism and deterministic solutions. With the financial crisis brought on by the unrestrained pursuit of personal and corporate profit, sanctioned by traditional economics, this is an opportune moment to establish a new way of approaching economic understanding based on new economic theory. It is also a good time to instigate new ideas on the approach to economic policy across a wide range of areas, such as macroeconomic and global governance, employment and unemployment, social security and pensions.

1. Introduction Philip Arestis and Malcolm Sawyer 2. The 'new economics' and policies for financial stability Philip Arestis and Malcolm Sawyer 3. Policy in the Wake of the Banking Crisis: Taking Pluralism Seriously Sheila C Dow 4. The reduction of the UK budget deficit: A Human Rights Perspective Diane Elson 5. Rethinking the Role of Wage Policy in the face of the euro crisis: Implications of the Wage-led Demand Regime Engelbert Stockhammer and Ozlem Onaran 6. A new economics approach to modelling policies to achieve global 2020 targets for climate stabilisation Terry Barker, Annela Anger, Unnada Chewpreecha and Hector Pollitt 7. Return of industrial policy? Robert Wade 8. Global Capital Markets, Direct Taxation and the Redistribution of Income Valpy FitzGerald 9. Expectations, Uncertainty and Institutions. An Application to the Analysis of Social Security Jesus Ferreiro and Felipe Serrano 10. Debt Monetization, Inflation, and the 'Neutral' Interest Rate Alfonso Palacio-Vera