----------------- HES POSTING -----------------
I just received the newsletter below, that I think will be of interest for HES members
(from the post-autistic economics newsletter).
Ana Maria Bianchi
Universidade de Sao Paulo
FRANCE
The French economics mainstream is in a state of shock and apprehension following dramatic
and unexpected events late in June.
On the 21st the influential Paris daily, Le Monde, featured a long article under the
headline "Economics Students Denounce the Lack of Pluralism in the Teaching Offered".
Economics students at the Ecole Normale Superieure, France's premier institution of higher
learning, were circulating with great success a petition protesting against an excessive
mathematical formalisation.
The petition notes "a real schizophrenia" created by making modelling "an end in itself"
and thereby cutting economics off from reality and forcing it into a state of "autism".
The students, said a sympathetic Le Monde, call for an end to the hegemony of neoclassical
theory and approaches derived from it, in favour of a pluralism that will include other
approaches, especially those which permit the consideration of "concrete realities".
Le Monde found French economists of renown, including Michel Vernieres, Jean-Paul Fitoussi
and Daniel Cohen, willing to speak out in support of the students. Fitoussi, current head
of the jury of the economics' agregation, said that "the students are right to denounce
the way economics is generally taught" and that the over-use of mathematics "leads to a
disembodiment of economic discourse". Daniel Cohen, economics professor at the Ecole
Normale Superieure, spoke of "the pathological role" played by mathematics in economics.
Meanwhile, The Minister of Education, Jack Lang, assured Le Monde that he would study
closely the appeal from the students.
French radio and television also reported thestudents complaints and confirmed their
legitimacy. On the 21st, BFM said that it was now recognized that "the teaching of
economics no longer had any relation with the real world" and that "this discipline is
going through an undeniable crisis". Also on the 21st, L'Humanite quoted extensively
from the students' open letter, while noting that in recent years several renown
economists had expressed similar views.
On the 23rd, Les Echos reported that a government report on university economics teaching
had reached conclusions similar to those of the students. In their lengthy article, Les
Echos noted that it is increasingly recognized that economics' "malaise is general and of
longstanding" and that "under the guise of being scientific" it has cultivated an anti-
scientific environment "which leaves no room for reflection and debate".
On the 26th, the weekly, Marianne, carried an article about the student petition against
"dogmatism" in the teaching of economics and for its replacement by "a pluralism of
explanations". Marianne said that the petition, which was now on the Web, had 500
signatures, as well as growing support from economics teachers and interest from the
highest levels of the French government.
On June 30th, Le Nouvel Economiste, referring to the students' petition and
"mobilisation", declared that economics had succumbed to a "pathological taste for
a-priori ideologies and mathematical formalisation disconnected from reality." Economics,
it continued, should give up its false emulation of physics and "should instead look to
the human sciences".
In July, French media interest continued to fuel the mobilisation. On the 3rd, La Tribune
featured a long article titled "Why a Reform of the Teaching of Economics". It began by
saying that all concerned parties agree that economics is in crisis and that "a debate
should be opened on this subject" and that the students' initiative aimed to bring this
about. Economics, said La Tribune, had become lost in "mondes iaginaires" and "l'Economie
de Robinson Crusoe" and intellectually enfeebled by "the dogmatism that reigns in the
teaching of the discipline." Alternatives Economiques carried an article titled "The
Revolt of the Students" which noted that French Nobel Prize winner, Maurice Allais had,
despite his mathematical approach, come to conclusions similar to those of the students.
L'Express, France's equivalent to Time, carried an article "L'Economie, science autiste?",
which aired the students' analysis and complaints. It also reported that the students'
petition now had more than 600 signatures, and that their teachers were now starting a
petition of their own in support.
On the 22nd of July, Politis reported on the students' cause and on the "autism" into
which economics had fallen in consequence of its "obsession to produce a social physics".
Politis noted that student support for the petition was widespread, including not only
students from the most prestigious universities, but also from the less celebrated, both
in Paris and in the provinces. "Pluralism should be part of the cultural base of
economists." Instead, "neoclassical theory dominates because it rests on a simple set of
axioms, easily mathematized." The coming academic year, concluded Politis, "promises to
be agitated."
We have learned that the economics students' petition now has 800 signatures and the
economists' petition 147. The latter includes some of the most illustrious names in
French economics, e.g., Robert Boyer, Andre Orlean, Michel Aglietta, Jean-Paul Fitoussi
and Daniel Cohen.
It concludes by calling for "a national conference that will open a public debate for
all."
UNITED STATES
At last month's 10th World Congress of Social Economics at the University of Cambridge,
American participants reported that in the USA the purge of non-neoclassical and non-
mathematically oriented economists from university faculties continues.
Conferees spoke of the increasing "stalinization" of the profession. Unlike in France
where the fight-back has begun, in the States there are not yet signs of the formation of
the critical mass needed to turn economics away from 19th century dogmas. It is agreed ,
however, that the number of academic economists in American who are out of sympathy with
the orthodoxy comprise a sizeable minority. But they are fragmented, often intimidated
and lack the means of joining together to exert their collective weight and moral
authority. Meanwhile, it was agreed, the American economics' clock runs backwards.
American economists at the World Congress traded horror stories about the new wave of neo-
classical "stalinization". History of economic thought courses are now being targeted as
sources of ideas whereby students might question or place in perspective orthodoxy. The
goal is to create "history-free environments" in which students can be indoctrinated "more
efficiently" into the neo-classical/mainstream belief system. For example, it was
reported that from this fall the University of North Carolina is discontinuing all history
of thought courses.
American participants also bemoaned plunging standards of literacy among economics
graduate students and colleagues as a consequence of the mathematics fetish. The
illiteracy problem is said to be particularly acute among new economics PhDs, many of whom
are incapable of reading with comprehension a page of complex prose, such as one from The
General Theory.
UNITED KINGDOM
The ideas expressed by the French students will have a familiar ring to readers of Tony
Lawson's Economics and Reality (1997). But in Lawson's UK it is reported that economics
students, although restless, are not yet rebellious. Meanwhile it is rumoured that a
French translation of Economics and Reality is imminent.
BELGIUM
Interest in the reform campaign launched in France spread quickly to Belgium. On June
24th under the heading "Economie autiste", the daily, Le Soir, both reported on the events
in France and offered its own anlysis of neoclassical economics as a quaint political
ideology masquerading as science.
A week later Le Soir featured a lengthy article on the crisis in economics. It draws on a
recent report by Michel Vernieres, commissioned by the French government to investigate
the teaching of economics. Vernieres emphasises that economic theories are devices for
conceptualizing reality. "Pedagogically, it is therefore essential to articulate
conceptual reflection and empirical investigation. . . . [and] to underline the plurality
of approaches and the overall coherence of these approaches."
Bernard Paulre, referring especially to neoclassical theory, said that mathematics is
often used to hide "the emptiness of the propositions and the absence of any concern for
operational relevance." He said that in addition to a-priori axioms, it is necessary for
economics "to take account of institutions, of history, of the strategies of actors and of
groups, of sociological dimensions, etc.."
------------ FOOTER TO HES POSTING ------------
For information, send the message "info HES" to [log in to unmask]
|
