Political Theory: History of Political Thought eJournal最新文献

{"title":"The Oomph in Economic Philosophy: A Bibliometric Analysis of the Main Trends, from the 1960s to the Present","authors":"Altug Yalcintas","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2211459","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2211459","url":null,"abstract":"In this essay, I quantitatively analyze the significance of scholarship in economic philosophy since the 1960s. In order to do so, I examine, through the number of publications and citations, the evolution of the main trends in economic philosophy over a fifty years period. This paper will develop a better conception of how the pathways of major debates, in particular rhetoric of economics (RoE) versus realism in economics (RiE), helped economic philosophy achieve its present status in economics. Viewed through this lens, it is clear that the main trends in the recent history of the discipline have emerged out of the concerns of non-mainstream economists since the 1980s.","PeriodicalId":397807,"journal":{"name":"Political Theory: History of Political Thought eJournal","volume":"50 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2013-02-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121921690","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Five Moral Philosophies on Economic Growth: Fundamental Perspectives on Assessing its Benefits and Costs","authors":"R. Nelson","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2211875","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2211875","url":null,"abstract":"Most economists are absorbed with writing papers for journals and other audiences and with other routine tasks of their professional lives. They have little time for introspective reflection on the moral philosophical - indeed, often secular religious - foundations of economics; indeed, they may not even be aware that contemporary economics rests on such a powerful set of value assumptions. The large role of moral philosophy in the historical development and now the current practice of economics is thus mostly left implicit and disguised. This paper briefly traces five traditions in moral philosophy that have contributed importantly to shaping the implicit value system of current economics: (1) the moral philosophy of Adam Smith of a “divine harmony” of market forces; (2) the “atheistic” utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill and other utilitarians; (3) the “worship” of perfect productive efficiency and the scientific management of society of August Comte and other French positivists; (4) the “faith” of Karl Marx, John Maynard Keynes and other progressive economists that the abolition of economic scarcity will save the world; and (5) the newer anti-progressive, anti-economic messages of contemporary environmental religion. The paper shows how powerful values derived from these moral philosophies not only play a large implicit role in economic policy making but in ethically justifying the very use of the technical methods of economics itself. This paper was presented to a panel organized by the Association of Christian Economists at the annual meeting of the American Economic Association in January 2013.","PeriodicalId":397807,"journal":{"name":"Political Theory: History of Political Thought eJournal","volume":"8 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2013-01-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115951874","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Adam Smith’s Argument for the Existence of an ‘Invisible Hand’","authors":"C. Hillinger","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2168777","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2168777","url":null,"abstract":"No other phrase has been as widely and as controversially used in the discussion of capitalism and markets as the ‘invisible hand’, a metaphor that Adam Smith used just once in each of his major works. There has been a debate as to whether Smith himself attached any importance to this metaphor. I do not deal with this issue directly. Instead, I ask another question that seems to me more relevant and interesting: Did Smith have a logical argument, call it a ‘proof’ if you will, as to why competitive economies would behave as suggested by the metaphor? I claim that the answer is a clear ‘yes’. Smith argued that the profit maximizing behavior of entrepreneurs leads them to produce the output that has the highest value that can be attained with given resources. The value of the total output is therefore a maximum also. This is precisely the condition that is also used in the most elegant mathematical proof of the efficiency of a competitive equilibrium. Comparing Smith’s argument with the Walras/Pareto approach raises important questions of methodology.","PeriodicalId":397807,"journal":{"name":"Political Theory: History of Political Thought eJournal","volume":"22 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2012-10-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"126153890","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Development as Division of Labor: Adam Smith Meets Agent-Based Simulation","authors":"Nathanael C. Smith","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2173846","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2173846","url":null,"abstract":"Adam Smith thought the key to raising productivity was specialization and the division of labor, but this explanation has been marginalized in economic theory because it doesn't fit into neoclassical models. Using agent-based simulation (in particular an adapted version of the Howitt-Clower model of money) to step outside the constraints of traditional Walrasian equilibrium, I show how allowing for an endogenous division of labor vindicates several explanation of long-run growth which neoclassical analysis seems to rule out. For example, it is not the case, as the Solow model purports to demonstrate, that growth based on capital accumulation has a well-defined upper bound due to diminishing returns and depreciation, except in the special case where population and capital previously sufficed to exhaust the scope for productivity-enhancing specialization. In other cases, capital accumulation triggers the introduction of new goods, which were technologically known but not economically viable, and there is no particular limit to how much growth might be achieved in this way. The model provides a template for multiple candidate explanations for the Industrial Revolution: higher savings rates, larger markets due to international trade, or one or two new inventions, could all suffice to ignite a virtuous cycle in which exploration of the goods space expands the division of labor, which raises productivity and drives further exploration of the goods space, both from the demand side (larger markets make it easier to cover fixed costs of producing a new good) and the supply side (more capital is available to overcome the fixed cost hurdle). The model follows Romer (1990) in interpreting technological change as introduction of new goods; complements Romer (1990) by showing why the state of technology might differ across countries even when they have access to the same knowledge; and rivals Romer (1990) by opening up the possibility that the costs of invention might not be an important factor limiting growth via the introduction of new goods. (The alternative story is that it's easy to invent goods once they've become economically viable.) All results are derived from a simulation software developed by, and available from, the author.","PeriodicalId":397807,"journal":{"name":"Political Theory: History of Political Thought eJournal","volume":"78 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2012-10-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125522692","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Thucydides as Prospect Theorist","authors":"Josiah Ober","doi":"10.2139/SSRN.1431169","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/SSRN.1431169","url":null,"abstract":"Opposing the tendency to read Thucydides as a strong realist, committed to a theory of behavior that assumes rationality as expected utility maximization, Ned Lebow and Clifford Orwin (among others) emphasize Thucydides’ attentiveness to deviations from rationality by individuals and states. This paper argues that Thucydides grasped the principles underlying contemporary prospect theory, which explains why people over-weight potential losses. Thucydides offers salient examples of excessive risk-aversion and excessive risk-seeking by decision-makers variously faced with high or low probabilities of losses or gains. Thucydides shows that leaders’ rhetoric can limit or exacerbate the political effects of bias in risk assessment.","PeriodicalId":397807,"journal":{"name":"Political Theory: History of Political Thought eJournal","volume":"33 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2012-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130213675","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Introduction to 'America's First Great Depression: Economic Crisis and Political Disorder after the Panic of 1837'","authors":"A. Roberts","doi":"10.5860/choice.50-0405","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5860/choice.50-0405","url":null,"abstract":"This is the introduction to \"America's First Great Depression: Economic Crisis and Political Disorder after the Panic of 1837.\"","PeriodicalId":397807,"journal":{"name":"Political Theory: History of Political Thought eJournal","volume":"40 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2011-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127358684","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Sociability and Morality of Market Settlements","authors":"Arielle John, V. Storr","doi":"10.4337/9780857936394.00029","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4337/9780857936394.00029","url":null,"abstract":"Since at least Max Weber, social scientists have looked closely at the nexus between markets and cities. Weber believed that cities and markets were inextricably linked. In his seminal work Economy & Society, for instance, Weber ([1921] 1978, p. 1213) describes the city as a market settlement. As he writes, 'a city...is always a market centre. It has a local market which forms the economic centre of the settlement and on which both the non-urban population and the townsmen satisfy their wants for craft products or trade articles by means of exchange.' The difference between a city and other settlements, then, is the existence of a market rather than the size of the population, or the type of dwellings, or the nature of the social activities that occur, or any other criteria that we might use. Although Weber's centrally located marketplaces have long since been replaced by malls and shopping plazas and high-rise business districts and swanky shopping streets, market activity is still at the centre of city life.","PeriodicalId":397807,"journal":{"name":"Political Theory: History of Political Thought eJournal","volume":"182 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2011-10-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114952831","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Stalinism - A Metamorphosis of Liberalism or Marx - The Last of the Liberals?","authors":"Bernard Paranque","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1808588","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1808588","url":null,"abstract":"Liberalism was born as a utopia against monarchy and religion; it became the ideology of capitalism. This essay sets out that Marx's thought is above all a criticism of capitalism, and therefore it also represents the utopia corresponding to capitalism, described as a \"communist\" utopia, the main thrust of which relates to social relations within capitalism. In this way he could be consider as a liberal. It is why Stalinism is more an avatar of liberalism rather than a Marxian heritage.","PeriodicalId":397807,"journal":{"name":"Political Theory: History of Political Thought eJournal","volume":"26 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2011-05-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"134435461","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Relevance of Intellectual Historian Herbert J. Muller and the Greeks in Asia Minor","authors":"DiMarkco Stephen Chandler","doi":"10.2139/SSRN.1812982","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/SSRN.1812982","url":null,"abstract":"Today the notion of freedom is frequently misunderstood. Draped in partisanship, its personification is called everything from inappropriate sexual behavior to thief and robbery of the highest political office in the United States. The ideal and idea of freedom has been so distorted and corrupted it appears that, our culture could conceivably face a more critical consequence then the constitutional crisis predicted by political pundits today. Such conditions provide an interesting backdrop for an inquiry into the life of intellectual historian Herbert Joseph Muller. Hence, the scope of this study will seek to highlight the relative aspects of Muller’s life by answering four insightful questions. First, what is intellectual history? Second, who is or who was Herbert J. Muller and what factors might have led him to pursue this brand of history? Third, what was his primary contribution to historical scholarship? Finally, why does Muller’s work remain valuable to the field of history, and why does it appear that modern historians are uninterested in what he has to offer.","PeriodicalId":397807,"journal":{"name":"Political Theory: History of Political Thought eJournal","volume":"11 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2011-04-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129595508","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Paul Boccara’s Analysis of Global Capitalism, the Return of the Bourbons, and the Breakdown of the Brussels/Paris Neo-Liberal Consensus: A Quantitative Analysis on the Political Economy of Our Time","authors":"Arno Tausch","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1726316","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1726316","url":null,"abstract":"This essay features on the global relevance of the political economy of the French political economist Paul Boccara from the viewpoint of quantitative international political economy. Our aim is to draw international attention to the fact that Boccara’s political economy is part and parcel of the wider French language debate on the instability of capitalism and the long economic cycles (Kondratiev cycles), which ranges, from the (former) Maoist Samir Amin to the Communist Boccara and the Trotskyst Ernest Mandel (1923-1995), and which is in good company of a wide variety of attempts to revive the debate on Kondratiev cycles (Devezas, 2006), which was a NATO Advanced Research Workshop on the influence of chance events and socioeconomic long waves in the new arena of asymmetric warfare in Covilha, Portugal, 14-18 February 2005. We briefly put the relevance of Boccara’s approach into the wider and necessary perspective of the more general long-cycle debate and we then feature the highlights of Boccara’s particular contribution to the current global economic depression, from which the world economy slowly recuperates. We show in the main part of this essay the empirical relevance of Boccara’s general approach, using advanced empirical methods of econometric and politometric time series analysis. We conclude by cautiously drawing some general consequences from our findings, especially for the current debate on the future of the European Union economic policies. Paul Boccara, over the last decades, provided a coherent framework of analysis, which reached similar policy prescriptions, independently from the Steindl/Kalecki approach in political economy, which we also introduce in this essay (against the ‘return of the Bourbons’). A Boccaran worldview would hold that the contradictions of global capitalism increase over time, if markets are left for themselves. Boccara is right in stressing that this system is, as he puts it, ‘mad’ because its logic of profitability is reaching its climax. Capitalism as a system, which puts making money before and against people lives, needs to be questioned. It is really futile to speak of ‘morality’ and ‘transparency’ without attacking the logic of the system. Our analysis, using advanced statistical techniques, also re-iterates empirical results, recently published by Korotayev and Tsirel (2010) and has shown in addition the following things: 1) liberal and ‘Marxist’ analyses of all ‘denominations’ are right in emphasizing the severe cyclical fluctuations of the capitalist system on a global scale 2) there is a world political and world strategic swing of societal system, which accompanies the economic ups and downs 3) and three there is a striking similarity in the logic of the globalized period of the second half of the 19th Century with our age. Globalization and monopolies lead towards stagnation. Boccara emphasized this since the early 1970s. Some other great political economists of the instability of the internat","PeriodicalId":397807,"journal":{"name":"Political Theory: History of Political Thought eJournal","volume":"38 9 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2010-12-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125702685","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}