Financialization, along with the growth of the financial sector in scale and power, and the increasing involvement of people with finance has been a central feature of industrialized economies since at least the late nineteenth century. In the era since circa 1980, rapid financialization has encompassed most if not all countries of the world, taking different forms and proceeding at different paces. Variegated financialization serves as a useful moniker for pervasive, yet differentiated, financialization. The GFCs of 2007– 09 brought to public attention the scale of the national and international financial systems and the ways in which those systems had not only grown but also evolved with the complexities of financial instruments. Financial crises have become frequent, imposing economic and social costs, and the GFCs brought into sharp focus the instabilities of the financial system and their global effects. The ways in which the financial sector had penetrated our lives through credit, debt and private pension provision were to some degree apparent. The GFCs and the aftermath raised questions about the scale and role of the financial sector in society, and a less relaxed attitude to the regulation of the financial system followed.

In this concluding chapter, I start by briefly reviewing the question as to whether, and to what extent, financialization has continued since the GFCs. In Chapter 4 I have briefly indicated some quantitative measures of financialization with comparisons between the post-GFC period with the preceding times. This discussion of any slowdown of financialization now is linked with issues as to whether the pace of globalization and of economic growth has continued in that period of time.

In earlier chapters, the relationship between financial development and economic growth have been explored, with the general observation that the growth of the financial sector often appears to be associated with a slowdown of economic growth. Advocates of the financial sector have often portrayed it as facilitating savings, funding and monitoring investment, and thereby promoting wider economic growth. From the perspective of growth promotion, the financial system has become dysfunctional. The climate emergency may well have to be addressed through slower economic growth, particularly in the industrialized nations but, in any case, with different structures of growth that are less carbon-intensive and environmentally damaging. A financial system that serves the public good would be one that allocates funds towards environmentally friendly “green” investment and away from environmentally damaging investments.