Essays on the Methodology and Discourse of Economics

Part 1 Economics as discourse: "Truth" and "Discourse" in the social construction of economic reality - an essay on the relation of knowledge to socioeconomic policy; the idea of the corporation as a person - on the normative significance of judicial language; machlup on knowledge - science, subjectivism and the social nature of knowledge; a critique of the discursive systems and foundation concepts of distribution analysis. Part 2 Methodology, policy and the social construction of reality: an essay on the nature and significance of the normative nature of economics; determinate solutions and valuational processes - overcoming the foreclosure of process; the methodology of economics and the case for policy diffidence and restraint; economics as a science and its relation to policy - the example of free trade; the Knight-Ayres correspondence - the grounds of knowledge and social action; on some fundamental issues in political economy - an exchange of correspondence. Part 3 Values and ideology in economics: ideology in economics; the historical treatment of the problem of value judgments - an interpretation you cannot derive "Ought" from "Is". Part 4 Reasoning in economics: on the attribution of causality and responsibility in macroeconomics; of lookout cows and the methodology of economics; economics and theology - the fundamental common problem; the pareto principle - another view; two concepts of "Politicization"; the pervasive proposition, "What Is, Is and Ought to Be" - a critique.