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        On the problem of formalism in economics

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        900705.pdf (PDF, 54Kb)
        Author
        Hodgson, G.
        Attention
        2299/5439
        Abstract
        In his Reorienting Economics, Tony Lawson cites this magnificently appropriate quotation by Mark Blaug (1997, p. 3): Modern economics is sick. Economics has increasingly become an intellectual game played for its own sake and not for its practical consequences for understanding the economic world. Economists have converted the subject into a sort of social mathematics in which analytical rigour is everything and practical relevance is nothing. I believe that on this issue, Lawson, Blaug and I are in agreement: the victory of technique over substance is a chronic problem within modern economics. Although the victory of formalism can be dated to the 1950s (Blaug 1999, 2003), by the 1980s the problem had become much more serious. Because mathematics has swamped the curricula in leading universities and graduate schools, student economists are neither encouraged nor equipped to analyze real world economies and institutions.
        Publication date
        2006
        Published in
        Voprosy Economiki
        Other links
        http://hdl.handle.net/2299/5439
        Relations
        Hertfordshire Business School
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