Description

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"A fascinating read. Gleeson-White artfully captivates the reader as she explores the fast-evolving language, metrics, actors and laws that are profoundly reshaping 'capital' in the 21st century." —Kate Raworth, author, Doughnut Economics

Climate change is here and capitalism is implicated: it's programmed to privilege profit and growth over human communities and the living earth. We need to change this system—and we need to do it now. Six Capitals charts the rise of four movements designed to overthrow capitalism as we know it: multi-capital accounting, for society, nature, and profit; the push for a new corporation legally bound to benefit nature and society while making a profit; ecosystem accounting for nations; and legal rights for nature, which resonate with indigenous earth-centered laws.These movements are critical for the future of human life on this planet. Together they override the profit-driven modern corporation, the growth-driven nation state, and the legal status of the natural world as lifeless property.

Multi-capital and ecosystem accounting, benefit corporations, and the rights of nature movement are here to stay. Six Capitals tells their story, from their first emergence in the postwar era to today. This revised, updated edition is for the new generations of business leaders, entrepreneurs, activists, accountants, economists, scientists, farmers, food growers and distributors, teachers, parents, politicians, bureaucrats, and concerned citizens everywhere.

"Broaden financial reports to include measures of social and environmental issues and just watch how it changes the behaviour of business people. Gleeson-White makes a good case for the success of her unlikely revolutionaries." —Sydney Morning Herald

"Six Capitals reveals the critical role of accounting in reimagining the way we do business and make policy in the twenty-first century. It's time for everyone to pay attention." —Carl Obst, lead author, United Nations System of Environmental-Economic Accounting

About the Author

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Jane Gleeson-White is the author of Double Entry: How the merchants of Venice shaped the modern world - and how their invention could make or break the planet, which won the 2012 Waverly Library Award for Literature and was shortlisted for the 2013 NSW Premier's Literary Awards, The Age Book of the Year Award, and the Queensland Literary Awards. She is also the author of Australian Classics and Classics. Jane is a PhD student in creative writing at the University of New South Wales and has degrees in economics and literature from the University of Sydney and was an intern at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice.

Praise For…

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"This is a seminal work on sustainability . . . Double Entry ended with a plea to accountants to become the heroes of sustainability and save the planet because only we can do it. Six Capitals tells us how . . . the clear message, that we must change our way of thinking, will be heard around the world because of books like this."  —Stanley Goldstein, New York Hedge Fund Round Table

"Whereas Double Entry was a wonderful work of accounting history, Jane Gleeson-White’s Six Capitals is an ambitious look at what we will account for in the future."  —Dylan Schleicher, 800-CEO-READ, North America

"So broaden financial reports to include measures of social and environmental issues and just watch how it changes the behaviour of business people. Gleeson-White makes a good case for the success of her unlikely revolutionaries."  —Sydney Morning Herald

"[L]ively and elegantly written account of the history of double-entry bookkeeping . . . This dynamic examination of the impact and legacy of double-entry bookkeeping is sure to appeal to those in the accounting profession, business leaders, and history buffs, and will likely become required reading in business school curricula."  —Publishers Weekly starred review of Double Entry