Thanks again. The issue seems perfectly clear now.

On 5/21/2011 10:55 AM, Colander, David C. wrote:
>
> Re Pat:
> Pat writes "I believe that David's history of economics leaves out a large chunk of economics. His recommendations regarding how to use the phrase "economic science" reflect a gap in his treatment of the history of economics. It is not ideological to take account of the classical observation that the division of labor tends to expand productivity or of the early neoclassical transformation of that observation into the view that the action of the entrepreneur role tends to be in the interest of the consumer role. It is an acknowledge of the reality discovered by our predecessors. The choice is not between ideology and science but between ignorance and knowledge."

> My view is that Classical economists had a much broader theory than did neoclassical economists--and dealt with issues that went far beyond what became neoclassical models. But it was all informal--the Classical science of economics never developed, because it got waylaid by a "neoclassical" revolution that, in part because it wanted to relate economics to policy, and in doing so stopped doing creative work in theory that would start to incorporate the complexities of increasing returns, feedback effects and non-linear dynamics into our general understanding. Economists such as Hayek, Veblen and Boulding recognized this, but they were not followed. Instead those who wanted to make economics policy relevant were followed.

Yes, I think I know that opinion. What you are denying, it seems to me, 
is that the Austrian theory of value and the marginal productivity 
theory of distribution are not part of the story of economic science 
that you want to tell.

This opinion, to me, is far more controversial than you realize. It 
basically flies in the face of the most famous historians of economic 
thought, including Schumpeter and Blaug. It is precisely why I 
criticized it.

The only reservation I have here is that I am not certain what you mean 
by a classical science of economics that never developed because it was 
waylaid.

It is important when considering neoclassical economics to distinguish 
between the mathematical version that developed and virtually 
overwhelmed the profession after the 1950s (but which had its roots much 
earlier of course, even in the work of Pigou) and the version that 
developed in the minds of Menger, Clark, Fetter, Davenport, and Knight. 
I suspect that you are not sufficiently familiar with the latter to 
compare it with the hypothetical classical economics science that you 
believe might otherwise have developed.

-- 
Pat Gunning
Professor of Economics
Melbourne, Florida
http://www.nomadpress.com/gunning/welcome.htm