Cambridge U. students re econ

[Eugene Coyle <eugenecoyle@xxxxxxx>]

>---------- Forwarded message ----------
>
>27 PhD-students at Cambridge University support the following
>open letter:
>
>                        Opening Up Economics:
>                  A Proposal By Cambridge Students
>
>As students at Cambridge University, we wish to encourage
>a debate on contemporary economics. We set out below
>what we take to be characteristic of today's economics,
>what we feel needs to be debated and why:
>
>As defined by its teaching and research practices, we
>believe that economics is monopolised by a single
>approach to the explanation and analysis of economic
>phenomena. At the heart of this approach lies a
>commitment to formal modes of reasoning that must be
>employed for research to be considered valid. The evidence
>for this is not hard to come by. The contents of the
>discipline's major journals, of its faculties and its courses all
>point in this direction.
>
>In our opinion, the general applicability of this formal
>approach to understanding economic phenomenon is
>disputable. This is the debate that needs to take place.
>When are these formal methods the best route to
>generating good explanations? What makes these methods
>useful and consequently, what are their limitations? What
>other methods could be used in economics? This debate
>needs to take place within economics and between
>economists, rather than on the fringe of the subject or
>outside of it all together.
>
>In particular we propose the following:
>
>1.  That the foundations of the mainstream approach be
>    openly debated. This requires that the bad criticisms
>    be rejected just as firmly as the bad defences.
>    Students, teachers and researchers need to know
>    and acknowledge the strengths and weaknesses of
>    the mainstream approach to economics.
>
>2.  That competing approaches to understanding
>    economic phenomena be subjected to the same
>    degree of critical debate. Where these approaches
>    provide significant insights into economic life, they
>    should be taught and their research encouraged
>    within economics. At the moment this is not
>    happening. Competing approaches have little role in
>    economics as it stands simply because they do not
>    conform to the mainstream's view of what
>    constitutes economics. It should be clear that such
>    a situation is self-enforcing.
>
>This debate is important because in our view the status quo
>is harmful in at least four respects. Firstly, it is harmful to
>students who are taught the "tools" of mainstream
>economics without learning their domain of applicability. The
>source and evolution of these ideas is ignored, as is the
>existence and status of competing theories. Secondly, it
>disadvantages a society that ought to be benefiting from
>what economists can tell us about the world. Economics is
>a social science with enormous potential for making a
>difference through its impact on policy debates. In its
>present form its effectiveness in this arena is limited by the
>uncritical application of mainstream methods. Thirdly,
>progress towards a deeper understanding of many
>important aspects of economic life is being held back. By
>restricting research done in economics to that based on
>one approach only, the development of competing research
>programs is seriously hampered or prevented altogether.
>Fourth and finally, in the current situation an economist who
>does not do economics in the prescribed way finds it very
>difficult to get recognition for her research.
>
>The dominance of the mainstream approach creates a
>social convention in the profession that only economic
>knowledge production that fits the mainstream approach
>can be good research, and therefore other modes of
>economic knowledge are all too easily dismissed as simply
>being poor, or as not being economics. Many economists
>therefore face a choice between using what they consider
>inappropriate methods to answer economic questions, or to
>adopt what they consider the best methods for the question
>at hand knowing that their work is unlikely to receive a
>hearing from economists.
>
>Let us conclude by emphasising what we are certainly not
>proposing: we are not arguing against the mainstream
>approach per se, but against the fact that its dominance is
>taken for granted in the profession. We are not arguing
>against mainstream methods, but believe in a pluralism of
>methods and approaches justified by debate. Pluralism as a
>default implies that alternative economic work is not simply
>tolerated, but that the material and social conditions for its
>flourishing are met, to the same extent as is currently the
>case for mainstream economics. This is what we mean
>when we refer to an "opening up" of economics.
>
>Support or comments? E-mail cesp@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx