Table Of ContentEssays on the Nature and State
of Modern Economics
What do modern academic economists do? What currently is mainstream
economics? What is neoclassical economics? And how about heterodox
economics? How do the central concerns of modern economists, whatever
their associations or allegiances, relate to those traditionally taken up in the
discipline? And how did economics arrive at its current state? These and
various cognate questions and concerns are systematically pursued in this
new book by Tony Lawson. The result is a collection of previously published
and new papers distinguished in providing the only comprehensive and
coherent account of these issues currently available.
The financial crisis has not only revealed weaknesses of the capitalist
economy but also highlighted just how limited and impoverished is modern
academic economics. Despite the failings of the latter being more widely
acknowledged now than ever, there is still an enormous amount of confusion
about their source and true nature. In this collection, Tony Lawson also
identifies the causes of the discipline’s failings and outlines a transformative
solution to its deficiencies.
Amongst other things, Lawson advocates for the adoption of a more
historical and philosophical orientation to the study of economics, one that
deemphasizes the current focus on mathematical modelling while maintaining
a high level of analytical rigour. In so doing Lawson argues for a return to long
term systematic and sustained projects, in the manner pursued by the likes of
Marx, Veblen, Hayek, and Keynes, concerned first and foremost with
advancing our understanding of social reality.
Overall, this forceful and persuasive collection represents a major inter-
vention in the on-going debates about the nature, state, and future direction of
economics.
Tony Lawson is Professorial Research Fellow of the Independent Social
Research Foundation and Reader in Economics at Cambridge University, UK.
‘This is a book of genuine originality, something that is rare in modern
academia and all too often confused with mere novelty. Few thinkers can
legitimately claim to have had a significant impact on their chosen field.
Fewer still can claim to have substantively changed the terms of debate of
that field. Tony Lawson is one of those few. These essays are for anyone
with an interest in the future of the discipline.’
Jamie Morgan, Reader in Economics, Leeds Beckett University;
Co-editor, Real-World Economics Review
‘Tony Lawson has changed the conversation.’
Edward Fullbrook, Executive Director of the World Economics Association
‘This book should be read by everyone concerned to remedy the
deficiencies in economics exposed by the 2008 financial crisis. Through
rigorous argument, Lawson shows that the answer is not more complex
forms of mathematical modelling, but the adoption of . . . methods
that recognize the open-ended, relational, and processual character of
economies.’
Diane Elson, Professor of Sociology, University of Essex, UK
‘Economics is notorious for a slapdash approach to its own methodology,
best epitomised by Friedman’s infamous “assumptions don’t matter”
paper. Samuelson rightly satirised Friedman’s position as “the F-twist”,
but despite this putdown, mainstream economists continue to use
Friedman’s obiter dictum as a way to escape having to consider the realism
of their methods. Tony Lawson provides the “L-correction” to Friedman’s
“F-twist”, by forcing economics to consider its ontology. If the L-correction
works, the reformed discipline of Economics may differ from Lawson’s
expectations, but it can only be improved by having to confront its current
unrealism.’
Steve Keen, Professor and Head of Economics, History &
Politics, Kingston University, London, UK
‘Tony Lawson is the enfant terrible of modern economic methodology.
Whether you agree with him or not, he makes you think. This collection of
(all but one) previously published papers is no exception. Highly
recommended for all those with the slightest interest in the current state
and nature of economic science.’
Dimitris Milonakis, Professor of Political Economy and Dean
of the Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Crete, Greece
‘There has been a growing sense of discontent with the economics
discipline since the outbreak of the Global Financial Crisis. Tony Lawson
argues that “the winter of our discontent” should be seen as much deeper
than the current debate conveys—tracing much further back in time than
2008, and at more fundamental methodological and analytical levels.
Lawson writes with clarity and with an intellectual passion. A must read
for any student of economics and political economy.’
Peter Boettke, Professor of Economics and Philosophy at George Mason
University, USA
‘For many years now Tony Lawson, whose background includes
mathematics and philosophy as well as economics, has been making a
sustained critique of the methodology and approaches of modern
economics. In this important book, which should be required reading for
all serious economists, regardless of their approach, Lawson sets out
starkly and systematically the substances of his criticisms. He outlines the
way forward towards constructive approaches in teaching, research, and
policy, allied with avenues for fruitful dialogue between the criticisers and
the criticised alike.’
G.C. Harcourt, Professorial Fellow, University of New
South Wales, Australia
Economics as Social Theory
Series edited by Tony Lawson
University of Cambridge
Social Theory is experiencing something of a revival within economics.
Critical analyses of the particular nature of the subject matter of social
studies and of the types of method, categories and modes of explanation
that can legitimately be endorsed for the scientific study of social objects,
are re-emerging. Economists are again addressing such issues as the rela-
tionship between agency and structure, between economy and the rest of
society, and between the enquirer and the object of enquiry. There is a
renewed interest in elaborating basic categories such as causation, com-
petition, culture, discrimination, evolution, money, need, order, organ-
ization, power probability, process, rationality, technology, time, truth,
uncertainty, value etc.
The objective for this series is to facilitate this revival further. In
contemporary economics the label “theory” has been appropriated by a
group that confines itself to largely asocial, ahistorical, mathematical
“modelling”. Economics as Social Theory thus reclaims the “Theory”
label, offering a platform for alternative rigorous, but broader and more
critical conceptions of theorizing.
Other titles in this series include:
1. Economics and Language 4. Who Pays for the Kids?
Edited by Willie Henderson Nancy Folbre
2. Rationality, Institutions and 5. Rules and Choice in
Economic Methodology Economics
Edited by Uskali Mäki, Viktor Vanberg
Bo Gustafsson, and
Christian Knudsen 6. Beyond Rhetoric and
Realism in Economics
3. New Directions in Economic Thomas A. Boylan and
Methodology Paschal F. O’Gorman
Edited by Roger Backhouse
7. Feminism, Objectivity and 19. The World of Consumption,
Economics 2nd Edition
Julie A. Nelson The material and cultural
revisited
8. Economic Evolution Ben Fine
Jack J. Vromen
20. Reorienting Economics
9. Economics and Reality Tony Lawson
Tony Lawson
21. Toward a Feminist
10. The Market Philosophy of Economics
John O’ Neill Edited by Drucilla K. Barker and
Edith Kuiper
11. Economics and Utopia
Geoff Hodgson 22. The Crisis in Economics
Edited by Edward Fullbrook
12. Critical Realism in Economics
Edited by Steve Fleetwood 23. The Philosophy of Keynes’
Economics
13. The New Economic Criticism Probability, uncertainty and
Edited by Martha Woodmansee convention
and Mark Osteeen Edited by Jochen Runde and
Sohei Mizuhara
14. What do Economists Know?
Edited by Robert F. Garnett, Jr. 24. Postcolonialism Meets
Economics
15. Postmodernism, Economics Edited by Eiman O. Zein-Elabdin
and Knowledge and S. Charusheela
Edited by Stephen Cullenberg,
Jack Amariglio and 25. The Evolution of Institutional
David F. Ruccio Economics
Agency, structure and
16. The Values of Economics Darwinism in American
An Aristotelian perspective institutionalism
Irene van Staveren Geoffrey M. Hodgson
17. How Economics Forgot History 26. Transforming Economics
The problem of historical Perspectives on the critical
specificity in social science realist project
Geoffrey M. Hodgson Edited by Paul Lewis
18. Intersubjectivity in 27. New Departures in Marxian
Economics Theory
Agents and structures Edited by Stephen A. Resnick and
Edward Fullbrook Richard D. Wolff
28. Markets, Deliberation and 35. Understanding Development
Environmental Value Economics
John O’Neill Its challenge to development
studies
29. Speaking of Economics Adam Fforde
How to get in the conversation
Arjo Klamer 36. Economic Methodology
An historical introduction
30. From Political Economy to Harro Maas
Economics Translated by Liz Waters
Method, the social and the
historical in the evolution of 37. Social Ontology and Modern
economic theory Economics
Dimitris Milonakis and Ben Fine Stephen Pratten
31. From Economics Imperialism 38. History of Financial
to Freakonomics Crises
The shifting boundaries Dreams and follies of
between economics and other expectations
social sciences Cihan Bilginsoy
Dimitris Milonakis and Ben Fine
39. Commerce and
32. Development and Community
Globalization Ecologies of social
A Marxian class analysis cooperation
David Ruccio Robert F. Garnett, Jr.,
Paul Lewis and
33. Introducing Money Lenore T. Ealy
Mark Peacock
40. Essays on the Nature and
34. The Cambridge Revival of State of Modern
Political Economy Economics
Nuno Ornelas Martins Tony Lawson
Essays on the Nature
and State of Modern
Economics
Tony Lawson
First published 2015
by Routledge
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© 2015 Tony Lawson
The right of Tony Lawson to be identified as author of this work has been
asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patent Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced
or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means,
now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording,
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writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and
explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Lawson, Tony.
The nature and state of modern economics / Tony Lawson.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Economics—Study and teaching (Higher) 2. Economics. I. Title.
HB74.5.L39 2015
330—dc23 2014036834
ISBN: 978-1-138-85101-6 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-138-85102-3 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-72441-6 (ebk)
Typeset in Palatino
by RefineCatch Limited, Bungay, Suffolk
To Julien and Chloe
Description:What do modern academic economists do? What currently is mainstream economics? What is neoclassical economics? And how about heterodox economics? How do the central concerns of modern economists, whatever their associations or allegiances, relate to those traditionally taken up in the discipline? An
