From Political Economy to Economics: Method, the social and the historical in the evolution of economic theory

by Milonakis; Dimitris

• ISBN13: 9780415423229
• ISBN10: 0415423228
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-12-09
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

In a new major work of critical recollection, Dimitris Milonakis and Ben Fine show how economics was once rich, diverse, multidimensional and pluralistic. The book details how political economy became economics through the desocialisation and dehistoricisation of the dismal science, accompanied by the separation of economics from other social sciences, especially economic history and sociology. It ranges over the shifting role of the historical and the social in economic theory, the shifting boundaries between the economic and the non-economic, all within a methodological context.

Author Biography

Dimitris Milonakis is Associate Professor and Head of the Department of Economics at the University of Crete Ben Fine is Professor of Economics at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London

Table of Contents

Preface	p. xii
Introduction	p. 1
General outline	p. 1
Main themes	p. 2
Main objectives	p. 9
Smith, Ricardo and the first rupture in economic thought	p. 11
Introduction	p. 11
Classical political economy: general themes	p. 13
Smith's dualisms, Ricardo's abstractions	p. 16
The first methodological rupture	p. 22
Concluding remarks	p. 26
Mill's conciliation, Marx's transgression	p. 27
Introduction	p. 27
John Stuart Mill: consolidation and crisis	p. 28
Karl Marx, dialectics and history	p. 33
Concluding remarks	p. 44
Political economy as history: Smith, Ricardo, Marx	p. 46
Introduction	p. 46
The invisible hand of history?	p. 49
Ricardo with Smith as point of departure	p. 53
The dialectics of value	p. 58
Concluding remarks	p. 68
Not by theory alone: German historismus	p. 71
Introduction	p. 71
The making of the German Historical School	p. 73
Methodological foundations	p. 78
Laws of development	p. 82
History without theory?	p. 85
Concluding remarks	p. 88
Marginalism and the Methodenstreit	p. 91
Introduction	p. 91
Marginalism and the second schism in economic thought	p. 93
Carl Menger and the Methodenstreit	p. 101
The aftermath	p. 109
Concluding remarks	p. 115
The Marshallian heritage	p. 119
Introduction	p. 119
Setting the scene: dehomogenising marginalism	p. 120
From soaring eagle ...	p. 127
... to vulgar vultures?	p. 134
Concluding remarks	p. 137
British historical economics and the birth of economic history	p. 141
Introduction	p. 141
British historicism: T.E. Cliffe Leslie	p. 142
The birth of economic history	p. 148
Concluding remarks	p. 154
Thorstein Veblen: economics as a broad science	p. 157
Introduction	p. 157
Institutions, evolution and history	p. 159
Veblen versus marginalism, Marx and the Historical School	p. 162
Veblen's evolutionary scheme	p. 164
Method and history in Veblen's work	p. 170
Concluding remarks	p. 174
Commons, Mitchell, Ayres and the fin de siecle of American institutionalism	p. 175
Introduction	p. 175
Commons' compromises	p. 176
Mitchell's empiricism	p. 182
Ayres' Veblenian themes	p. 186
Concluding remarks	p. 188
In the slipstream of marginalism: Weber, Schumpeter and Sozialokonomik	p. 191
Introduction	p. 191
Constructing social economics or Sozialokonomik	p. 193
From value neutrality and ideal types to methodological individualism	p. 198
Constructing histoire raisonee: Sombart and Weber	p. 202
Concluding remarks	p. 214
Positivism and the separation of economics from sociology	p. 216
Introduction	p. 216
Twixt logical and non-logical: Pareto and the birth of sociology	p. 219
Lionel Robbins: squaring off the marginalist revolution	p. 224
Souter's reaction	p. 228
Introducing positivism: From Hutchison to Friedman	p. 230
Talcott Parsons and the consolidation of sociology	p. 236
Concluding remarks	p. 243
From Menger to Hayek: the (re)making of the Austrian School	p. 245
Introduction	p. 245
Carl Menger and the slippage from marginalism	p. 246
The formation of the Austrian School: Bohm-Bawerk and Wieser	p. 250
Leaving marginalism behind: from Mises' praxeology ...	p. 254
... To Hayek's spontaneous orders	p. 259
Concluding remarks	p. 267
From Keynes to general equilibrium: short- and long-run revolutions in economic theory	p. 268
Introduction	p. 268
No micro without macro: the rise of Keynesianism	p. 270
Keynes and the philosophical foundations of economics	p. 275
General equilibrium or trooping the techniques	p. 279
Paul Samuelson: synthesis versus revolution?	p. 285
Concluding remarks	p. 293
Beyond the formalist revolution	p. 295
Introduction	p. 295
From implosion of principle to explosion of application	p. 297
Concluding remarks	p. 308
Notes	p. 309
References	p. 327
Index	p. 356
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