Summary

This book contains ideas to develop interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary views on economy and society. It aims to disseminate non mainstream ideas on various subjects related to economics and global society. The book is organised in six parts. Part 1 contains the key thoughts of Prof. J. Backhaus on the concept of state sciences and of Prof. A. Klamer on the importance of culture for economics. Parts 2- 6 contain successively contributions in the areas of population and society, history and economic theory, corporate issues, environment, and international relations. Examples of the content are: the changes of family life cycles due to the rise of non-traditional households; subjective and objective inflation rates after the introduction of the Euro; the economics of genetic engineering; the contribution of foreign direct investment to the economic development of host countries; the inaccuracy of economic models applied in places characterized by extreme income disparities; the improvement of political and corporate governance; evolutionary thinking and emission trading; freedom versus order in the European Union; the reform of social policy in Europe. The book provides interesting creative multi-disciplinary ideas with respect to various topical issues concerning the contemporary global society. It is highly recommended for social scientists in search of broad views on social science and society.