What next? An explanation of the 2008-2009 slump and two scenarios of the shape of things to come

In order to build scenarios of possible futures and grasp the structural liabilities and tendencies of global financial markets, we do not need just historical analogies to past crises and collapses but also a conceptual-theoretical model that explains the characteristic mechanisms of financial markets. Firstly, I summarise the neoclassical understanding of financial markets and its characteristic effects. This understanding gave ex post legitimisation to the re-emergence of global finance in the early 1970s, and has subsequently justified and encouraged its rise to predominance in the world economy. I provide reasons to suspect that the orthodox account is misleading not only because it has been unable to anticipate the 2008-2009 crisis (or any other major crisis) but more fundamentally because it lacks insight even into the basic operations of financial markets. Secondly, I sketch an explanatory model of the 2008-2009 financial crisis, based on Keynes and Minsky as well as on concepts derived from Schumpeter, chaos theory and theory of collective action and rationality. This explanation provides the basis for two short-term scenarios of future developments, involving the possibility of a major crash in the late 2010s or around 2020; (also pathological) learning; and the emergence of green global-Keynesian policies and institutions. I conclude by suggesting that the era of neoliberalism is likely to come to an end by 2030, having lasted for about half a century.