Cristovam Buarque argues that economic theory, if it is to continue to command either public respect or intellectual confidence in its relevance to the realities of the modern world, must incorporate the need for an ethical system to guide its endeavours and prescriptions. At a time when our civilisational model is in crisis as a result of global environmental degradation and the failure of development to solve the problem of poverty, economics must accept that there. Have to be limits to growth and that the increasing inequality between both classes and countries is neither morally tolerable nor politically sensible. The very notion of economic progress needs to be rethought. Technological advance must respect nature, and the fetishism of applying economic theories without regard to their human consequences must be abandoned. This powerful exploration provides an essential starting point for those economists who see the need for a. Breakthrough to a new and more enduring paradigm in their discipline.