Is the economics profession/discipline monolithic or pluralist? This question might sound self-indulgent, but it is well-intentioned. It is a product of some recent media exchanges in Australia/New Zealand. The libertarian economists who dominate both opinion and policy sound off about the indubitable truth of their sayings and the absolute necessity of the attendant political 'reforms' (privatisation', etc) being effected, all being based on sound scientific principles. Moreover, this breed claim to be not merely right but also public-spirited; they are not cold-hearted and opportunist but have our best interests at heart. On occasions that I have criticised these people in the media, some colleagues have claimed: it's the fault not of the economics discipline per se; but rather of a particular brand of economics. My own view tends to the monolithic explanation. There's little or no public outcry locally from so-called 'moderates' about the adverse public impact of the discipline. But apart from the personnel, the whole thing is structured monolithically. The libertarian right have the whole core conceptual apparatus at their disposal. The profession is full of 'decent people' but it's their analytical contribution rather than their values which count. Take Arrow for example - a nice guy, but his impact has been disastrous. There was of course an age of 'Keynesianism'. But it seems to me to have been an ephemeral aberration (in any case, its political impact was significantly less than Keynesians imagine, and its intellectual differences less than Keynesians imagine). But Keynesianism has now been written out of history, and the profession is now back on track. In a sense, dissenters within the discipline are a contradiction in terms. We are effectively, non-economists. What is our impact on the centre of gravity of the discipline? Stuff all. Do we have a public impact? Isn't it time for another major onslaught on disciplinary priorities, rather than stuffing apprentice dissidents with rubbish in the hope that they can get a job within the inner sanctum? Meantime, I don't have any foibles in attacking economics per se and economists generically as antithetical to both social and material well-being. WOuld anybody like to disabuse me of this dogmatic position?
