Growth theory after Keynes, part II: 75 years of obstruction by the mainstream economics culture
Part I of this essay explained the sequence of events that enabled the neoclassical paradigm to regain its dominant position in mainstream economics following serious challenges by ‘Keynesian’ economists. This second essay seeks to answer the question of why the economics profess...
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| Formato: | article |
| Lenguaje: | DE EN FR |
| Publicado: |
Editura ASE Bucuresti
2014
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| Acceso en línea: | https://doaj.org/article/35e16036757643dcab8195339595c0a2 |
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| Sumario: | Part I of this essay explained the sequence of events that enabled the
neoclassical paradigm to regain its dominant position in mainstream economics
following serious challenges by ‘Keynesian’ economists. This second essay
seeks to answer the question of why the economics profession was so willing to
sustain the neoclassical paradigm in the face of the reality-based challenges by
‘Keynesian’ economists like Harrod and Domar. The answer is sought in the
culture of economics, the history of science in general, and the study of power
in the field of political economy. This article draws heavily on the work of the
French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, who divides culture into habitus (procedures
and dispositions) and doxa (more abstract beliefs and philosophies), in order to
provide insight into how culture affects economic thinking. Bourdieu’s concept
of symbolic violence helps to explain how a narrower neoclassical growth model
was enthusiastically accepted as a replacement for the ‘Keynesian’ Harrod-Domar
growth model. Financial and business interests clearly understood the power of
culture and they used their accumulated wealth to support the neoliberal doxa
and neoclassical habitus that would induce economists to willingly provide
intellectual cover for policies that benefitted those financial and business
interests. We conclude with a discussion on how the history of thought on
economic development might have evolved if the Keynesian paradigm, and its
dynamic Harrod-Domar model, had prevailed |
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