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A striking account of how orthodox economics became the way it is, how it is changing, and why it remains unfit for purpose.
Relative to other social sciences, economics as an academic discipline is at the extremes in its methodology, theory, conceptualisation, methods, and knowledge of and reference to its own history as a discipline. It has also been increasingly intolerant of alternative approaches and negligent of interdisciplinarity other than on its own narrow core principles. By contrast, heterodox economics is shown to be vibrant and wide-ranging despite the repressive tolerance exerted by orthodoxy through Americanization and monopolization of the discipline.
Ben Fine is Emeritus Professor of Economics at SOAS University of London and Visiting Professor at Wits School of Governance, University of Witwatersrand, South Africa. His most recent books include Material Cultures of Financialisation, co-edited with Kate Bayliss and Mary Robertson (2018); Race, Class and the Post-Apartheid Democratic State, co-edited with John Reynolds and Robert van Niekerk (2019); and A Guide to the Systems of Provision Approach: Who Gets What, How and Why, with Kate Bayliss (2021). His Marx’s “Capital” (2016) is now in its sixth edition (with co-author Alfredo Saad-Filho). He was founding Chair of the International Initiative for Promoting Political Economy (iippe.org) until June 2023.
Contents
Preface and Acknowledgements
List of Figures and Tables
1 Straddling the Orthodox/Heterodox Economics Divide
1 Introduction
2 From Orthodox Economics …
3 … to Heterodox Economics …
4 … and Beyond
5 Concluding Remarks
2 Endogenous Growth Theory: A Critical Assessment
Postscript as Personal Preamble
1 Introduction
2 New Growth for Old?
3 Opening a Can of Dynamics
4 Statistical Conundrums
5 The Favoured Terrain of Applications
6 Concluding Remarks
3 Competition and Market Structure Reconsidered
Postscript as Personal Preamble
1 Introduction
2 Competition and the Determination of Market Structure
3 A Critical Reassessment
4 Prospecting for Political Economy
Postscript as Personal Preamble
1 Introduction
2 From Dismal to Paradoxical Science?
3 Social Science Strikes Back?
4 From Paradoxes to Progress?
Appendix 1
Appendix 2
5 “Useless but True”: Economic Crisis and the Peculiarities of Economic Science
Postscript as Personal Preamble
1 Introduction
2 From the Crisis of Capitalism …
3 … to the Crisis of Economic Theory …
4 … to Political Economy
6 Beyond the Tragedy of the Commons: A Discussion of Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action
Postscript as Personal Preamble
Engaging Elinor Ostrom
7 The General Impossibility of Neoclassical Economics
Postscript as Personal Preamble
1 Introduction
2 Formalism and Content in Economic Theory
3 Russell’s Paradoxes
4 Implications for Economics
5 Broader Considerations
6 Keynes and the Philosophical Foundations of Economics
7 Concluding Remarks
8 Interrogating Sickonomics, from Diagnosis to Cure: A Response to Hodgson
Postscript as Personal Preamble
1 Introduction
2 From the Social …
3 … to the Individual?
4 And Methodological Individualism
5 And from Formalism …
6 … to Markets …
7 … and a Bit More if Not All
9 Economics – Unfit for Purpose: The Director’s Cut
Postscript as Personal Preamble
1 How Economics Got Its Spots
2 Economics and Ethics
10 Post-truth: An Alumni Economist’s Perspective
Postscript as Personal Preamble
1 Mathematical Beginnings
2 From the Social and the Aggregate …
3 … to the State and the Systemic
4 And the Micro-foundations of Macro or the Other Way About?
5 The State of South Africa, the Military, and Cost Benefit Analysis Is Good?
6 Social Capital, the World Bank and All That Jazz
7 Economics Imperialism and Mainstream Authoritarian Monopoly
8 Prospects for Alternatives
Appendix 1
Appendix 2
11 Mathematical Economics as Aid or Obstacle to Heterodox Economists? A Personal Experience: The Director’s Cut
Postscript as Personal Preamble
1 Introduction
2 The Mainstream Is Wrong on Its Own Terms
3 Mainstream as Critical Point of Departure
4 Mathematics and Heterodoxy in Its Own Right
5 Concluding Remarks
References
Index