Re: URPE = UPE?
BRIAN, BECAUSE YOU ARE NOT PERHAPS RADICAL OR RADICAL ENOUGH.THE ANSWER IS BE RADICAL.FIKRET On Wed, 31 Aug 1994, Brian Eggleston wrote: I am receiving many messages in duplicate. Is anyone else so afflicted? Is there anything I can do to remedy the problem? Thanks. Brian Eggleston [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: URPE = UPE?
The idea of repressing the R in URPE reminds me of Cardenas' electoral strategy in Mexico. In the interest of winning friends on Wall Street and the Mexican upper middle class, Cardenas and his party softened their message, and became the friends of free trade and marketization. So they gave their potential supporters nothing to get enthusiastic about, while failing to win friends in high places. The right made enormous progress over the last 15-20 years by appropriating leftish language about revolution, radicalism, and justice. At the same time, the left gets more mealy-mouthed by the day. Of course our message and our program need rethinking and retuning, but dilution gets you nowhere. Doug Doug Henwood [[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Left Business Observer 212-874-4020 (voice) 212-874-3137 (fax)
urpe=upe?
As I look around URPE the fear is that the average age is advancing about a year per year. Even as a reformer or worse I can realize that we need to do something to make the group seem more with-it. I suggest that we change the name to the Union of Totally Rad Political Economy. Joe Persky P.S. Yes, when doing work in a more mainstream context the content definitely shifts toward more orthodox. I can't imagine anyone denying this. Clearly, however, some of us shift more than others.
Re: URPE = UPE?
I think the big issue is not getting rid of the word "radical" but defining what it means these days. When I talk to my orthodox colleagues it isn't the radical that bothers them but whether we are doing anything relevant or simply just trying to hold on to the old faith. I think its important that RRPE starts developing some ties with other heterodox journals and to give a clear definition of its mission. I would also like to see URPE form its own listserv so it can carry out some serious continuous dialogue with its members. -Ric Holt Elon College e-mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: URPE = UPE?
Doug, this is an oversimplification, but it's a bit like: you're a radical who does desktop publishing as against a practitioner of "radical desktop publishing". Of course, the analogy breaks down at various points, since political economy is not apolitical. But it is not (or at least need not be) politically driven, either. Part of it *is* simply technical, like desktop publishing. Peter Dorman
RE: URPE = UPE?
Better yet (more in line with this way of thinking-e.g., message below), why not simply call it "economics" and forget about the adjective "political" as well as "radical"? there already are organizations and journals that fill these spaces? why shouldn't there continue to be one that is not afraid to use the word "radical"? If there is a problem of perception,then we have to do a better job at explaining/convincing etc., not run away--under the cover of technique and "disciplinary" loyalty--as I am afraid happens all too often. If someone does not want the word radical to appear on their vita, nobody is forcing that on them as it is. Antonio Callari Doug, this is an oversimplification, but it's a bit like: you're a radical who does desktop publishing as against a practitioner of "radical desktop publishing". Of course, the analogy breaks down at various points, since political economy is not apolitical. But it is not (or at least need not be) politically driven, either. Part of it *is* simply technical, like desktop publishing. Peter Dorman Antonio Callari E-MAIL: [EMAIL PROTECTED] POST MAIL: Department of Economics Franklin and Marshall College Lancaster PA 17604-3003 PHONE: 717/291-3947 FAX:717/399-4413
Re: URPE = UPE?
It strikes me as naive to believe that one could hide one's political stance by keeping words like radical off of one's resume. If one is so deep in the closet waiting out the seven years to a tenure decision, I suspect it would be hard to find the door at that time. But let's do an empirical test: How many of the folks out there in PEN-L land have successfully pursued this low-profile strategy? And how many folks like Julie or myself have survived without expending energy on camouflage? Sandy Thompson Department of Economics Vassar College [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: URPE = UPE?
An organization called UPE will attract different people and develop in a different way than an organization called URPE. Calling ourselves "radical political economists" was already a compromise with the fear of being labelled "Marxist economists." Are we going to end up with an organization where self-identified "Marxist economists" feel unwelcome? Edwin Dickens
Re: URPE = UPE?
First, I don't think the word "radical" should be dropped to improve anyone's career chances. It is a matter of principle. Having said that, I will admit to having expunged RRPE articles from my vita, but the real boost came when I also eliminated *any* publication outside the narrow specialty particular employers were looking for. The shorter my vita, the more interviews I got. (I still didn't get any jobs out of those interviews, however, so perhaps the whole strategy was pointless.) In other words, I think the real drawback of publishing in RRPE is that, unless you are marketing yourself specifically as a specialist in radical economics, you run the risk of appearing insufficiently narrow. Peter Dorman
Re: URPE = UPE?
I do think some of the recent postings on the URPE name change issue are missing the serious point and attending instead to more trivial matters, such as what difference the name makes on resumes. The real issue concerns the audience accessible to those of us who believe there is a better [feasible] way. Do we advocate via a boldly named forum like that we have now, with the consequence that many reasonable folks who might be open to our approaches and proposals self-select out, leaving us to talk basically among ourselves? Or do we water down the public image, infiltrating the mainstream, if you will, [rather like Cockburn on the op-ed page of the Wall Street Journal] but risk losing our identity and any coherence in our message in the process? This is a difficult issue and might best be tackled by some empirical investigation: how serious is the problem of self-selection out of the URPE orbit (i.e., how many of your social science colleagues read RRPE? how many are economists? are any "non- radicals"?)? What have been the experiences of those radical economists who have ventured into the mainstream to publish and advocate? Have they been included as tokens? Marginalized more within than outside of the "neoclassical" circle? Had their ideas or even their research agendas coopted by their non-radical affiliations? As a younger (pre-tenure) economist deeply concerned about the fading identity of the left, I would ask members of this list (especially the more senior folks) to contribute some personal reflections on these and related issues. Since I gather that the proposed (?) name change is not stemming from a fabulous new opportunity but instead from a sense of growing isolation, we need a sense of how "bad" each of the bad options is. In solidarity -- Chris Barrett === Christopher B. Barrett Phone: (608) 262-9491 Depts. of Agricultural EconomicsFax: (608) 262-4376 and Economics Internet: [EMAIL PROTECTED] University of Wisconsin-Madison 427 Lorch Street Madison, WI 53706
Re: URPE = UPE?
I am receiving many messages in duplicate. Is anyone else so afflicted? Is there anything I can do to remedy the problem? Thanks. Brian Eggleston [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: URPE = UPE?
Posted on 31 Aug 1994 at 17:32:31 by Uriacc Mailer (002033) Re: URPE = UPE? Date: Wed, 31 Aug 1994 14:31:31 -0700 Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: "Chris Barrett" [EMAIL PROTECTED] I do think some of the recent postings on the URPE name change issue are missing the serious point and attending instead to more trivial matters, such as what difference the name makes on resumes. The real issue concerns the audience accessible to those of us who believe there is a better [feasible] way. Do we advocate via a boldly named forum like that we have now, with the consequence that many reasonable folks who might be open to our approaches and proposals self-select out, leaving us to talk basically among ourselves? Or do we water down the public image, infiltrating the mainstream, if you will, [rather like Cockburn on the op-ed page of the Wall Street Journal] but risk losing our identity and any coherence in our message in the process? .. stuff deleted .. Chris Barrett I think Chris' point is right on the money. I sometimes cringe when I assign RRPE articles to my class because I strongly suspect some students dismiss or pigeonhole the article ahead of time because it comes from a "radical" journal. In part this stems from a strong subjectivist, pomo position advocated by one of my colleagues, so that many of our students come to think everything is relative and simply a matter of opinion. Since RRPE articles label the opinion for them, the students don't have to evaluate the article for themselves. Other journals, e.g. the Cambridge Journal of Economics or even the Journal of Post-Keynesian Economics don't have this problem (most of our students don't know the difference between a Post- Keynesian and a Post-Office, so even though they recognize the latter journal as having a particular slant, they have no idea what that slant is). So a more innocuous title might make the journal more useful, although I honestly don't know what else I would call it. Marsh Feldman Community Planning Phone: 401/792-2248 204 Rodman Hall FAX: 401/792-4395 University of Rhode Island Internet: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Kingston, RI 02881-0815 "Marginality confers legitimacy on one's contrariness."
Re: URPE = UPE?
I now regret even more that I had to leave before the URPE Summer Conference "Business" meeting (where I assume this issue of excising 'Radical' from our name came up -- as it has before) and I heartily second the postings of Feldpauch, Dorman, and Laffey. There is *much* that could be said about in this debate, and almost all of it of interest has been said more than once, but -- to repeat a venerable point in language we might not have used a quarter of a century ago -- the goal of achieving social institutions which offer equal opportunity to flourish (or at least the most opportunity possible for those least able to flourish) remains a *radical* aspiration. This goal is not that difficult to explain at an elementary level, but it requires creative political economic analysis (still incomplete and contested) to make more precise, and -- extremely importantly -- it is an ideal overwhelmingly compelling to fellow humans who think the matter through. We should never give up on this. The word 'radical' does require *some* explanation, but such explanations are what URPErs should be delighted to provide. Frank Thompson
