There operates an interaction between theory production and economic reality: theories are created in reaction to developments in reality and serve then as "navigation maps", thereby changing reality in turn. Keynes' theory, e.g., originated from analysing the Great Depression and provided the basis for shaping economic policy in the prosperity phase: strict regulation of financial markets focussed striving for profits on the real economy. The success of this "real-capitalistic" order (full employment and building up the welfare state) and its consequences (offensive trade unions, leftist "Zeitgeist", etc.) lay in the 1960s the ground for the renaissance of (neo) liberal theories, the ideological basis of the "finance-capitalistic" order which shifts striving for profits from the real to the financial economy. What conclusions regarding the position reckoning in the long cycle can be drawn from this interpretation? Which are the requirements for humane economic theories? What changes in economic policy might pave the roads to new prosperity?