Talk:Heterodox economics movement

Article Checklist for "Heterodox economics movement"

Workgroup category or categories	Economics Workgroup, Sociology Workgroup, Politics Workgroup [Editors asked to check categories]
Article status	Developed article: complete or nearly so
Underlinked article?	No
Basic cleanup done?	Yes
Checklist last edited by	J. R. Campos 07:06, 8 April 2007 (CDT)

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a couple questions

Could the article define what it means by "heterodox"? What are they heterodox in comparison to (was it the same in the early 19th century as it is today)? Also, all of the trends mentioned seem to be various forms of socialism. Would a more specific title perhaps be appropriate?—Nat Krause 17:29, 25 March 2007 (CDT)

So far yes. The split between the "orthodox" traditions and the "heterodox" traditions begin with Rousseau and start widening more and more. When we arrive in late XXth century you will feel more confortable about the term "heterodox".

Wait for the baritone, the article is in its very first stages...Guru2001 21:47, 25 March 2007 (CDT)

PS - I think your doubts you will be cleared once we do the "Ricardian Socialists". There the meaning of "heterodox" becames closer to today's.

Guru2001 21:57, 25 March 2007 (CDT)

Would not it be clearer to speak about alternative economic system arising as responses to failures of mainstream classical and neoclassical economics?

Crises of Capitalism in the nineteenth century gave rise to Marxist and Georgist economics. The 1930s gave rise to Social Credit of CH Douglas and Binary Economics of Louis Kelso. Admittedly none of these people were trained economists but that may be their strength in perceiving the flaws of dominant economic models.

Janos Abel 17:47, 17 April 2007 (CDT)

Links

Can you, João, or anyone else for that matter, please replace all of the external links that are placed in-line in the body of this article with links to CZ articles? I did this with the first instance of Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

Also, I assume that "Economic heterodox tradition" is a term of art among economists? --Larry Sanger 19:26, 25 March 2007 (CDT)

Point 1> I did not understand what you meant.

Point 2> Yes, it is. But as everything in Economics, some certainly will not agree...

Guru2001 21:49, 25 March 2007 (CDT)

PS - If you want to get realy "confused" about "heterodox traditions", read the following:

I do not wish to imply that individuals working mostly within heterodox traditions in economics could not themselves make a contribution to philosophical ontology. On philosophical matters the flow of insights can be both ways between projects in ontology and the heterodox traditions in economics. Indeed, currently there is real blossoming of insightful output by heterodox economists and others critically interacting with and seeking to shape (at the least the application of) the sort of ontological perspective described above, a perspective often systematised as critical realism in economics. See in particular Arestis, Brown and Sawyer, 203; Beaulier and Boettke, 2004; Davis, 2004; Dow, 1999, 2003; Downward, Finch and Ramsey, 2003; Downward and Mearman, 2003a, 2003b; Dunn, 2004; Finch and McMaster (2003); Graça Moura, Mario da, 2004; Hands, 2004; Hargreaves Heap 2004; Kuiper, 2004; Lee, 2003; Lewis, 2004a, 2004b; McKenna and Zannoni, 1999; Nell, 2004; Olsen, 2003; Pagano, 2004; Pinkstone, 2003; Rotheim, 1999; Setterfield, 2003; Smithin, 2004.

Full text:

http://pdfdownload.bofd.net/pdf2html.php?url=http://www.bresserpereira.org.br/Terceiros/05.5.Heterodox_Economics.pd

On point (1): you wrote, for example, Jean-Jacques Rousseau. This is a link that points to an external source. But in that place, instead of a link to an external source, we want a link to our own article, even if it does not exist yet: Jean-Jacques Rousseau. We place links to external articles in an "External links" section in the endmatter. Please see CZ:Article Mechanics about endmatter. --Larry Sanger 22:46, 25 March 2007 (CDT)

Article title

I'm not an editor or scholar in economics (I do have my BA in this subject), but I don't recall hearing the term "economic heterodox tradition", precisely, before. Also, it gets no google hits at all.—Nat Krause 16:21, 27 March 2007 (CDT)

On the Economis per se issue...

A previous Nobel Memorial Prize winner in economic science gives a more critical report:

"Page after page of professional economic journals are filled with mathematical formulas leading the reader from sets of more or less plausible but entirely arbitrary assumptions to precisely stated but irrelevant theoretical conclusions.....Year after year economic theorists continue to produce scores of mathematical models and to explore in great detail their formal properties; and the econometricians fit algebraic functions of all possible shapes to essentially the same sets of data without being able to advance, in any perceptible way, a systematic understanding of the structure and the operations of a real economic system (...)"

(Wassily Leontief, 1982, p. 104).

Guru2001 07:59, 27 March 2007 (CDT)

Begin with a definition

Please, do see CZ:Article Mechanics; articles should begin with definitions. "Heterodox tradition" means something in economics; what does it mean? Anything more precise than "socialism"? --Larry Sanger 20:15, 3 April 2007 (CDT)

"heterodox" in the sense of a demarcation from the prevailing mainstream in Economics. It includes (but it is not restricted to) the various strands of socialism. For more information see: Heterodox Economics Journals (Scholarly) at Heterodox Economics WebJ. R. Campos 14:47, 22 April 2007 (CDT)

Begin with a simple definition.. Sounds easy...

While the subtext and group identities of "heterodoxy" are blurry around the edges and like a ven diagram include groups who overlap differently with the core ideas, we think a workable set of principles can be identified that constitute heterodox approaches to economics. Among the concerns we would put in the heterodox core are the following:

1) A substantive rather than procedural definition of economics, i.e., a definition of economics by its subject matter rather than by its techniques of analysis (e.g., constrained optimization). This concern de-privileges mathematics as a language and invites attention to the potential contributions of history, anthropology and other social sciences to economic analysis.

2) A concern with the nature of human well being, in broader terms than GDP maximization (HDI maximization ??)http://hdr.undp.org/hdr2006/statistics/, and an expectation that economic analysis will highlight how economic activities affect well being. This concern tends to emphasize the importance of topics such as income and wealth distribution, the quality of work life, the viability of community, and the requirements of sustainability instead of the de facto privileging of GDP maximization in neoclassical economics.

3) A concern with how economic activities affect both individual experience and the construction of society. This concern invites skepticism about the ability of methodological individualism to adequately analyze economic events and invites a more nuanced and potentially skeptical view of the merits of regulated and unregulated markets for organizing economic activity. The concern also invites analysis of capitalism as a social as well as economic system.

4) A concern with the ethical issues surrounding economic activities. This concern calls into question the oversimplified way neoclassical economists differentiate positive from normative economics, and encourages increased evaluation of economic outcomes from an ethical perspective.

5) A rejection of neoclassical theory's tendency to abstract from social contexts, be it with respect to institutional arrangements, human motivation (homo economicus), uncertainty and imperfect information, the assumption of perfect competition, the specificity of a monetary economy, etc.

J. R. Campos 16:53, 22 April 2007 (CDT)

Locke

...is a utopian socialist? Huh? --Larry Sanger 20:35, 22 April 2007 (CDT)

List vs. explanation of concept

This article right now, as useful as it might be, takes the form of a list of thinkers who, it is alleged (but by whom?), are part of the "heterodox tradition." But in virtually none of this is it actually explained what the heterodox tradition is--and what members of this "tradition" might have in common that warrant us calling it a "tradition" at all--and why it matters. It is also important, I should think, to detail any criticisms of this tradition, if there are any in currency.

I don't understand what the difference is between the heterodox tradition and socialism, broadly construed. The claim is made that "Leading heterodox thinkers have moved beyond the established paradigms of Austrian, Feminist, Institutional-Evolutionary, Marxian, Post Keynesian, Radical, Social, and Sraffian economics," but the article proceeds to give all sorts of Marxian, Radical, Social, etc., thinkers as examples. The implication, I suppose, is that contemporary "heterodox thinkers" have "moved beyond" these "established paradigms." It also doesn't explain how they have "moved beyond," a claim which I find pretty hard to believe, frankly. Intellectual fads in every field are all too often just recycled, repackaged, relabelled versions of the same old hash; I doubt economic thinkers are any different.

Joao, I think we need to get some other economists and political theorists involved here; my feedback is not enough. --Larry Sanger 20:46, 22 April 2007 (CDT)