In our latest episode of What is to be Done, we sat down with Steve Rocco, co-founder of the Arketa Institute, to talk about one of the most fundamental challenges of our time: the gap between modern science and the economic theories that still govern our financial systems. What makes Steve's perspective particularly striking is where it comes from. He has spent his career inside the financial system, from trading desks at Bank of America and Goldman Sachs to impact investing, green bonds and private placements. It is precisely that experience, he argues, that made the contradictions impossible to ignore.

His argument is straightforward but radical. The neoclassical economics that dominates our institutions, business schools and financial markets was built before much of what we now know about the biosphere and planetary boundaries. Ecological economics offers a different framework, one where the economy exists within nature, not alongside it.

A central theme in the conversation is the concept of multi-capital, the idea that wealth cannot be reduced to financial capital alone. Social capital, natural capital and community are not soft add-ons but fundamental components of a functioning and sustainable economy. The episode also digs into what a post-growth pension system might look like in practice. Steve makes the case that pension funds are not just a financial instrument but a political one, and potentially a powerful lever for change. Pensioners sit on boards of trustees. They are also voters. That combination, he argues, is deeply underestimated.

The episode does not offer easy answers, but it reframes the question in a way that feels both urgent and, oddly, hopeful.

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