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The discussion seems to have shifted, largely as a result of Nitasha's
12-23 post, from a concern with doing proper history of "economic thought"
to (1) the question of whether and how ideology influences such histories
and, more recently, to (2) the question of how ideology influences
professional economists.
The relationship between ideology and economics is, it seems to me, rather
difficult to disentangle unless one is careful to define terms. I believe
that one of the the best, if not the best, at making definitions and at
sticking to those definitions in his argumentation is Ludwig von Mises.
Several years ago, I wrote a short essay describing Mises's views of the
relationship between economics and ideology. I would like to recommend that
list members interested in this subject take a look at this essay.
One point may be worth emphasizing here. Mises was an economist from
Austria. Because much American Austrian economics today promotes a kind of
natural rights ideology with overtones of anarchism and because such
promotion comes from an institute with Mises's name, some readers may
mistakenly mark Mises as an advocate of modern libertarianism. I have
argued in several papers that this is an error. On the contrary, Mises
advocated a value-free economics, although he reached the conclusion that
the argumentation that developed from such an economics supported the old
liberal ideology and did not support socialism. If you are inclined to
hastily reject Mises's ideas on economics and ideology on the grounds that
they are associated with libertarianism, I suggest that you hesitate.
The paper, which is entitled "Mises on Economics, Ideology, World View, and
the Aim and Method of Economics." It is online at the following web
address:
http://www.constitution.org/pd/gunning/subjecti/workpape/misideo.htm
--
Pat Gunning, Feng Chia University, Taiwan
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