Neoclassical Economic Fiction and Neoliberal Political Reality: Criticism of the “Single Thought” in Political Economics

Abstract

We can observe today the domination of a certain current of thought in economic theory, which can provisionally be characterized as the “neoclassical–neoliberal–orthodox” mainstream. However, in a field where the confrontation of theoretical referents is inherent to the work of the researcher, is such consensual thinking, or “single thought” even thinkable?

Keywords:

• economic theory
• philosophy
• history of thought
• criticism
• single thought

Notes

¹The very different treatment of the concept of infinity in philosophy (ever since the head-on clash of the paradoxes of Zeno and the paralogisms of Aristotle's Physics) and mathematics (from Leibniz and Newton's differential calculus to Cantor's transfinite numbers).

²For a presentation of this debate, see Herrera (2001, 2010a).

³See, respectively, Greenspan (2007), Soros (2008), and Stiglitz (2006).

⁴Reread what the “gnawing criticism of the mice” has left of their German Ideology (Marx and Engels 1947).

⁵For a definition of “high finance” from a Marxist point of view, see Herrera (2010b, 102–4).

⁶Sometimes, this support is also supra-national. The World Bank actually took off under Robert McNamara's mandate at its head—after he had personally taken care of Vietnam's “development” as US Secretary of Defence.

⁷By classics, we mean the “scientific” economists (beginning with Petty and Boisguilbert); and by liberals, the thinkers of the liberal society (from Hume, Smith, Turgot).

⁸See, for example, Kirman (1992) or Malinvaud (1996). On this point, see Herrera (2006a).

⁹A typical example is provided by Jevons (1888, 239–41), attributing the paternity of utility-value to Ricardo in the last part (“The Origin of Value”) of chapter IV of his Theory of Political Economy. The rescue of the law of comparative advantages by neoclassical advocates of free trade is another one.

¹⁰The mainstream logical, deductive diagrams are opposed by Wallerstein (2001, 151–52): “the present determines the past, and not the opposite.”

¹¹Let us mention just one example. In his famous Theory of Political Economy, William S. Jevons (1888, 55) wrote: “I contend that all economic writers must be mathematical so far as they are scientific at all.” Then, “The theoretical conception of a perfect market is more or less completely carried out in practice” (153). And, last but not least: “It is evident that questions of this kind depend greatly upon the character of the race. Persons of an energetic disposition feel labour less painfully than their fellowmen, and, if they happen to be endowed with various and acute sensibilities, their desire of further acquisition never ceases. A man of lower race, a negro for instance, enjoys possession less, and loathes labour more” (263).

¹²Read here the preface to von Mises' (1951, 11) book Socialism: “But just because they cannot think for themselves, the masses follow the lead of the people we call educated. Once convince these, and the game is won.”