The return of the knowledges of subsistence

Abstract

The economic crisis is what Illich called «a real crisis» because it supports two opposite solutions: 1. increasing dependencies to markets; 2. selectively renounce to certain goods and services. This paper argues for the second solution. To make it possible, the history and epistemology of economics are more important than all the micro-and macroeconomics. Choosing the first solution will only increase a characteristic of modern economy which is its ability to generate wealth summits alongside depths of misery. Seen as an invitation to selective renunciation, the crisis can be a stimulus to the real policy options, that is, the options that seriously consider the return of subsistence knowledges that were subjugated by the economic system.