Scholars@Duke
Dirk Philipsen

Dirk Philipsen

Associate Research Professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy
Sanford School of Public Policy
dirk.philipsen@duke.edu
Box 90245, Durham, NC 27708
Sanford School of Public Policy, 201 Science Dr (Room 114), Durham, NC 27708
Office hours

Selected Publications

Poverty is not Permanent

Other Aeon · February 10, 2025 In *Poverty is not Permanent*, Anirudh Krishna and Dirk Philipsen challenge the conventional view of poverty as a static condition, arguing instead that it is a fluid state shaped by structural forces and individual circumstances. Drawing on research from ... Open Access Link to item Cite

Why? On our Failures of Imagination to Accomplish Dignity for All

Other Virtues and Vocations · November 12, 2024 This essay argues that the persistent inability to ensure universal human dignity stems from a catastrophic failure of imagination. Despite unprecedented global wealth and expertise, societies remain entrenched in paradigms of exponential growth and indivi ... Open Access Link to item Cite

What Counts—Why Growth Economics is Failing Us

Journal Article Journal of Consumer Culture · August 1, 2023 A rapidly growing body of research suggests that modern economies find themselves at existential crossroads: both prosperity and survival are a function of consumption-fueled economic growth. Prosperity seemingly depends on it; survival is made increasingl ... Full text Cite

Introduction: Moral and Market disordering in the time of Covid-19

Journal Article Cultural Dynamics · August 1, 2021 This special issue composed of essays that brainstorm the triadic relationship between Covid-19, Race and the Markets, addresses the fundamentals of a world economic system that embeds market values within social and cultural lifeways. It penetrates deep i ... Full text Open Access Cite

The tragedy of the private: Theft, property, and the loss of a commons

Journal Article Cultural Dynamics · August 2021 In a world of escalating climate crisis, metastasizing market logic, structural racism, growing inequality, and a global pandemic, this essay argues, the tragedy is not one of the commons, but one of the private. The relentless capitalist focus on ... Full text Cite

Private gain must no longer be allowed to elbow out the public good

Other Aeon · April 24, 2020 This essay critiques the dominance of private profit over collective well-being, arguing that economic systems prioritizing growth and individual wealth accumulation have undermined public goods, social equity, and environmental sustainability. Philipsen e ... Open Access Link to item Cite

“Beyond GDP – The Economics of Wellbeing”

Chapter · October 21, 2019 The Routledge Handbook of Global Sustainability Governance provides a state-of-the-art review of core debates and contributions that offer a more normative, critical, and transformatively aspirational view on global sustainability ... ... Cite

Enduring shortcomings

Journal Article Cultural Dynamics · July 2016 Full text Cite

The Little Big Number - How GDP Came to Rule the World and What To Do About It

Book · 2015 In one lifetime, GDP, or Gross Domestic Product, has ballooned from a narrow economic tool into a global article of faith. It is our universal yardstick of progress. As The Little Big Number demonstrates, this spells trouble. While economies and cultures m ... Link to item Cite

Environmental Economics

Chapter · June 28, 2011 Cite

We Were the People Voices from East Germany’s Revolutionary Autumn of 1989

Book · 1993 Communism was dead, the Cold War was over, and freedom was on the rise—or so it seemed. We Were the People tells the story behind this momentous event. ... Cite

GDP’s Wicked Spell

Other The Chronicle of higher education Open Access Cite