Personalist Economics: Unorthodox and Counter-Cultural

There are two reasons why personalist economics lies outside the mainstream. Personalist economics (1) rejects the premises of mainstream economics, and (2) takes exception to certain dominant values of today's culture whereas the mainstream is much more at ease with contemporary Western culture. This paper addresses both reasons and is organized accordingly. In it the author argues that the individualism and the autonomous individual of mainstream economics have their roots in the seventeenth-eighteenth century Enlightenment, that is well before the development of electronic means of communication. Personalism and the acting person of personalist economics emerged during the electronic stage of communication and, the author argues, are much better suited to the twenty-first century. The author calls for a reconstruction of economics which would replace the autonomous individual with the acting person.     

Tracing the Origins of Personalist Economics to Aristotle and Aquinas

Personalist Economics has identified a central problem in Neoclassical Economics that originates in its representation of the economic agent as homo economicus and its grounding in individualism. Both flaws are directly addressed by Personalist Economics that has a different perspective on human nature as set forth in Personalism. Our remarks are presented in three sections. In the first section we address why individualism is an unsatisfactory philosophical foundation for modern economic theory. In the second section we trace the origins of Personalist Economics to Aristotle and Aquinas. While others, such as Heinrich Pesch and Joseph Schumpeter, played important roles in the evolution of Personalist Economics, here our efforts are restricted to the contributions of Aristotle and Aquinas. In the third section we explore how, in terms of 18 tenets, Personalist Economics and a Personalist economy differ from Mainstream Economics and the individualistic market economy.     

Personalist Economics: Moral Convictions,Economic Realities,And Social Action

We examine the relationship between the administrative enforcement of environmental regulation, ethnic heterogeneity, and other community characteristics in New Jersey and New York. We find that the percentage of non-white population in a community is positively related with administrative penalties imposed on violators. However, penalties are lower in more ethnically diverse communities. This result may be due to the fact that these communities are less likely to coordinate to create solidarity across ethnic groups and demand stronger enforcement.     

A Century of Scottish Economics

A review of the development of economics, and of university teaching and research in economics since the foundation of the Scottish Economic Society a century ago. Contrasts the Victorian world of do-it-yourself economics with no economic journals or societies and university teaching in the hands of the professor of moral philosophy with the current situation with 12 Scottish universities in place of 4 and a staff of over 240 in Scotland compared with a total of 30 in the United Kingdom in 1890. Economists have multiplied, new branches of the discipline have developed, the subject has been revolutionised.     

马克思主义经济学与西方主流经济学比较

本文将两大经济学理论的深层内核结构均归结为四个维度的基本要素紧密相联的整体,其中作为核心生长点的基本价值倾向的差异使两大理论的内核结构形成了不同内涵,表现耿市场偏好与市场批判,个体主义与整体主义,资源配置视角与利益关系视角,均衡分析方法与矛盾分析方法的根本差异。通过对两大理论体系在其核心理论－－价值理论与收入分配理论方面的深层比较分析,可发现二者在哲学底蕴上还存在着现象主义与本质主义,现实主义与理想主义的重大差别,而这些差异也都是与二者深层内核结构特别是基本价值倾向的差异紧密相联的。     

经济学理论潜含的利益取向探析——马克思经济学与现代西方主流经济学比较研究

马克思经济学从根本上是代表弱势群体的利益,反映弱势者对社会正义的要求,从而不承认现实的合理性。相反,现代西方主流经济学是为既得利益服务的,它用伦理实证主义价值观来为现实进行解释和辩护,以供求均衡来合理化社会制度,从而具有强烈的保守主义倾向。     

保险经济学研究述评

保险经济学是用一般经济理论来研究有关保险领域问题的一门学科。作为一门独立的学科 ,保险经济学在国外已经得到较大的发展 ,它所探讨的问题和分析方法在主流经济学和金融经济理论中也占有很重要的位置。然而在我国 ,该学科的研究还很不充分 ,很少有人使用规范的经济学研究范式对我国的保险业进行深入而细致的分析。本文按照保险经济学历史发展的逻辑顺序 ,对该学科发展过程中的几个重要方面做了简要评述 ,在此基础上分析了保险经济学在结合我国的实际情况时应注意的几个方面 ,以期引起这方面更深入的讨论。     

A Nightmare in Introductory Economics

In a pair of 1925 lectures, John Maynard Keynes described world economic history with reference to a classification of stages developed by John R. Commons. This article examines Keynes’s two 1925 lectures in the context of Commons’s writings. It spotlights lesser-known aspects of Commons’s scholarship and helps clarify ambiguities in Keynes’s two addresses. It also identifies a key document, written by Commons, upon which Keynes relied when developing his presentations. In addition, the article explains how the work of Commons and Keynes in the 1920s has relevance for the contemporary development of evolutionary Keynesianism (which can also be called Post-Keynesian Institutionalism).     

西方经济学与马克思主义经济学关于生产理论的比较——一个方法论的视角

西方经济学与马克思主义经济学的生产理论研究方法上存在三个方面本质区别:西方经济学的生产理论是以"经济人"假设为出发点,把劳动者仅仅作为生产要素研究;而马克思主义经济学的生产理论是以"历史的、现实的人"为出发点,把劳动者既看作生产要素,又作为生产主体来研究.西方经济学的生产理论只研究生产一般,因而使用价值(即效用)范畴是其研究的核心;而马克思主义经济学则不仅研究生产一般,更注重研究生产的具体社会形式,因而把价值范畴作为研究的核心.西方经济学用个体主义方法,把生产理论仅仅置于微观领域来研究,致使其理论体系在微观与宏观上形成脱节;而马克思主义经济学则运用唯物辩证法,在宏观和微观的有机联系中研究资本主义的生产和再生产问题.     

A Multidimensional Ranking of Australian Economics Departments

This study uses cluster analysis to classify Australian economics departments into groups that have similar quantities of research output, measured by two publication counts, and similar quality of research output, measured by a citation count. Three groups of departments are identified and factor analysis is used to rank the groups. Whether research output is measured in total or on a per staff basis, Melbourne is in the group that ranks first, the remaining members of the 'group of eight' are in one or other of the top two groups, and at least 15 other departments are in the third-ranked group.     

语言的经济学分析:一个综述

本文对语言经济学这门新兴交叉学科的产生与兴起、研究现状及其学科定位等进行了总结和评述。语言经济学孕育于民族主义问题之中,发端于加拿大的官方语言问题,它的兴起成就于人力资本理论和教育经济学。语言经济学有广义与狭义之分。广义上,语言经济学采用经济学的理论、方法及工具,把语言和言语行为当作普遍存在的社会和经济现象来加以研究;狭义上,语言与劳动收入关系研究、语言政策与语言规划的经济学分析、语言动态发展的经济学分析以及博弈论在语言学中的应用等构成了当前语言经济学研究的主要内容。伴随着经济的全球化,语言经济学的重要性正在提升,一方面,语言经济学为语言学的相关研究提供了新的视角和思路,带来新的分析工具;另一方面,它也正在为经济学自身提供新的研究话题。     

Backwater Economics: A Life Story

Abstract:

Economics is sometimes portrayed as a contest between saltwater and freshwater, between the coastal pseudo-Keynesians and the Great Lakes neo-Walrasians, between the flaws-and-friction model-builders and the free-market hard-liners. As evolutionists know, both habitats are fairly sterile. Evolution occurs in the backwaters, in the mudflats, bogs, lagoons, cypress swamps, and wetlands, in the shadows of perpetually endangered habitat. This essay sketches a personal journey through the backwaters. Intellectually they are my home, as they have been for every other recipient of the Veblen-Commons prize, with just one exception …     

Public-Private Partnerships A Public Economics Perspective

Public-private partnerships (PPPs) are spreading all over theworld. It may be quite plausible that they were initially startedmainly as an attempt to evade expenditure controls and hidepublic budget deficits. But if they are properly designed andtransparently reported, PPPs can play a useful role in enhancingthe efficiency of the provision of services that were suppliedbefore solely by the public sector. This article provides apublic economics perspective on PPPs. (JEL codes: H54, L33)     

A Dream Experiment in Development Economics

In this article, the authors discuss a unique project carried out by 13 teams of four students each in the undergraduate Development Economics class during the 2012 spring semester at a private liberal arts college. The goal of the “Dream Experiment” was to think of an idea that promotes development, employs concepts from development economics, uses a real-world situation from a developing country, and has implications for policy if the experiment goes ahead. The authors present details of the project's modus operandi, provide a case study as an example, and highlight lessons for economics pedagogy.     

A Television Experiment in College Economics

Although nearly two dozen studies have dealt with the use of TV in teaching economics in one way or another, much remains to be said on the subject. Danielsen and Stauffer provide some interesting new information on the effectiveness of television as compared with conventional techniques. Their experimental design, as well as their immediate findings, will be of interest to others employing television as a teaching device.     

关于经济转型方式的理论思考

社会实践使前苏联、东欧各国、中国等计划经济国家从20世纪80年代末90年代初先后走向了向市场经济转型的漫漫征程。各转型国家选择了不同的转型方式,结果也各不相同。它们选择不同的转型路径,主要不取决于各国领导集体个人志趣等外在因素,而取决于其当时的社会主要矛盾。