----------------- HES POSTING ----------------- I regret that I could not attend the History of Economics Society meeting this year. I would have been interested in attending the session on Yuval Yonay's book THE STRUGGLE OVER THE SOUL OF ECONOMICS: INSTITUTIONALIST AND NEOCLASSICIST ECONOMISTS IN AMERICA BETWEEN THE WARS. Having now read the book, here are some comments. It seems to me that the book was well worth publishing, and I, at least, can accept much of what it says. Certainly, it was a pleasure to recall material that I had worked through when I did my dissertation. It was pleasing to see that someone else noticed it. However, it seemed to me that the chapter on value(s) was less than perceptive. Perhaps even mistaken. I thought the last chapter, the conclusion, was an assertion of an approach, not something that emerged from the study itself. Further, its seems to me that what Yonay has blithey called "mathematical economics" goes some distance in answering the questions asked in the Old Institutional and Old Neoclassical Economics. Does he give sufficient space to the New Institutional Economics? Should he not have dealt with the continuity of questions as much as the changing fashion in approaches and policy leanings? The reading did bring me to an understanding of how Joan Robinson might be labeled a Marshallian. Mea culpa. However, I still think that in some sense she was profoundly Marxian. If you are not talked out on the matter, what think you? Robin Neill ------------ FOOTER TO HES POSTING ------------ For information, send the message "info HES" to [log in to unmask]