Someone made a reference with respect to radical economists to
"Institutional economist if there are any" or something to that effect.
This, I think is a gross misrepresentation of the state of
institutionalism as a vibrant stream in contemporary economics. JK
Galbraith is a continuing icon of radical institutionalism (the title of
a relatively recent book by  William Dugger).  As one of the Canadian
economists that came from this tradition and who still practice it  and
teach it to students (at least until I retired last year), I find it
very useful as a way of engaging students and also introducing them to
radical (marxist) theory.  For those of you who do not make the
connection between marxian analysis and institutional analysis, I
suggest you look at the chapter by Arthur K. Davis whom I worked with
briefly in the 1960s -- I think the title is something like "Veblen: The
Marxist Key" in a book called American Radicals.  Interestingly, I just
had an e-mail from two former students in a course called Canadian
Economic Problems where we used institutional analysis to look at
contemporary problems who both commented on how useful the analysis was
(and to quote one, "what an inspiration even so many years later")  to
their understanding of economics.

I would thus not restrict the concept of radicalism to some specific
details of orthodox thought but rather extend it to include
methodological approaches that reject the whole concept of
'homo-economicus'.

Paul Phillips

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