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In a message dated 97-08-17 20:07:03 EDT, Pat writes: 
 
<< Whatever we take "neoclassical economics" to be, don't you think that 
 the first step is to contrast it with "classical economics?" If this is 
 so, the value of the term lies with its rejection and/or improvement of, 
 "classical economics." In this respect it seems sensible to try to find 
 the features that are common to the work of Smith, Ricardo, Malthus, and 
 (perhaps) Mill. Having identified those features, we could proceed to 
 compare them with the features of later economics that are opposed to, 
 and/or and advancement of, them. 
  
 One essential difference, it seems to me, is the emergence of the 
 functional concept of the entrepreneur, which led at least some 
 distinguished economists (Menger, Davenport, Wicksteed, Knight?) to 
 abandon the traditional tripartite classification of the factors of 
 production.  >> 
 
The obvious problem here, it would seem, is that many (perhaps most) 
'neoclassical' economists _didn't_ and _haven't_ abondon the traditional 
tripartite classification of the factors of production.  Furthermore, as 
far as 'neoclassical' is distiguished in contemporary discussions from 
'Austrian' or 'Marxist' or 'institutionalist' or 'post keynesian', the 
abandonment of the traditional tripartitie classification of factors of 
production might in fact be used to distinguish some 'Austrians' from 
some 'neoclassicals', but the same wouldn't be true in the case of 
distinguishing, for example, some 'Marxists' from some neoclassicals. And 
many 'Austrians' share a tripartite division with many 'neoclassicals'.  
In any case, the extent to which most economists have in fact abandoned 
the traditional triparte classification of the factors of production is 
itself controversial, e.g. there are many 'classical' elements remaining 
in Knight, (as there were in Clark, Marshall, Walras, etc., etc.) which 
seperate his work on capital theory from that of the most purely 
marginalist' of all capital theorists, F. A. Hayek. 
 
In part, the classification problem remains because the problems in theory 
remain to be solved -- i.e. the reconciliation of the modern marginal 
valuation principles with the problems of the valuation of factors of 
production. A quick and dirty definintion of 'neoclassical' economics 
which capture the current state of theory would then be:  the incomplete 
economics of those who have accepted marginal valuation principles, but 
who have not yet been able to free them from incompatible elements from 
the classical value tradition and the ancient tradition in epistemology.  
I.e. an economics which accepts marginal valuation, but which hasn't come 
up with either a satisfactory application of these principles to the 
valuation of the factors of production  -- or a satisfactory explanatory 
strategy for their use in providing plausible causal explanations for 
problem raising patterns in our experience.  Pat may think that my answer 
begs the question, but this again would only be an expression of my thesis 
-- that the definition is not decided, because the theoretical and 
explanatory issues remain essentially contested and unresolved, even if 
many if not most in the so-called 'mainstream' have more pressing 
'technical' worries to devote their time to. 
 
Greg Ransom 
Dept. of Philosophy 
MiraCosta College 
UC-Riverside 
[log in to unmask] 
http://members.aol.com/gregransom/hayekpage. 
 
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