The globalised money system is not a naturally occurring phenomenon to be studied scientifically buy beyond human control, rather like the weather. On the contrary, the globalised economy is a man-made system. As such, it history, institutions and operating systems can be studied with a view to the adaptation of the structure governing society. This paper introduces social credit, a Christian-centred approach to the study of the economy, setting it within the content of the wider literature from which it evolved.
In recent decades narrow subject specialisms, and specialisms within subjects, have precluded an holistic approach to the study of the relationship between the money economy and the human and natural worlds which support it. Economic history and the history of economic thought have become all but excluded from the formal academic curriculum. This paper takes the form of a brief review of the 20th-century literature on the economy, land and society, exploring their inter-connectivity. Central to the paper is H. J. Massingham's The Tree of Life, which surveys contemporary and historical literature on the subject.
Published in 1943, The Tree of Life links the loss of love of the land with the loss of love of the Christian religion. Additionally, this paper establishes common links between the work of J.R.R. Tolkein, Thorstein Veblen, Clifford Hugh Douglas and others. A comparison is drawn between the 20th-century works and Alastair McIntosh's Soil and Soul.
A full version of Frances's paper on The Tree of Life is available for download here (platerpap.pdf: 36KB).