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Articles

Beyond the positive–normative dichotomy: some remarks on Colander's Lost Art of Economics

Pages 375-390 | Published online: 30 Nov 2012
 

Abstract

In a series of articles later collected in his book The Lost Art of Economics, David Colander argues that the dichotomous distinction of positive and normative economics has misled economists into treating applied policy economics as part of positive economics and hence adopting the methodology of positive economics for applied policy analysis. Colander therefore urges a reintroduction of the art of economics and calls for a serious discussion on the appropriate methodology for applied policy work. This paper first explores some points not thoroughly examined by Colander in his arguments regarding the art of economics, in particular on its scope and the nature of judgements in the art of economics. It then examines the potential challenges to the tripartite division of economics, the presupposition of Colander's arguments for the art of economics, by examining, respectively, Tony Lawson's and Daniel Hausman's discussion on positive economics as a separate body of knowledge.

Acknowledgement

The author is grateful to Professor David Colander, Professor Sumitra Shah and the referees for their valuable comments on the early drafts of the article.

Notes

1. At the end of Chapter 2, Keynes clearly states that his book is a treatment of positive economics: ‘The chapters that follow relate almost exclusively to the scope of political economy conceived as a positive science, and to the methods whereby the theorems of this science are to be established’ (Keynes Citation1917, p. 66).

2. Wade Hands is one of the few economists who clearly differentiate ‘ethically normative’ from ‘non-ethically normative’. See Hands (Citation2012).

3. Instead of using the term judgements of non-moral obligation, this paper replaces obligation with precepts, as this type of judgement is conditional: unless we desire the end, we do not have an obligation to follow the precept.

4. In Lawson's view, event regularities are a relatively rare occurrence not only in the social realm, but also in the natural realm (Lawson Citation2009a, p. 764; Citation2009b, pp. 126–127).

5. It is likely that what Hausman is arguing is the undesirability not the impossibility. If this is the case, Hausman could make his position more explicit and this would help future scholarship have a clearer focus when exploring the relationship between positive and normative issues in economics.

6. The argument here is not to deny that the selection of research topic is often affected by researchers' conscious or unconscious ideologies. Following Backhouse's (Citation2005) distinction between intellectual value judgments and social/political value judgments, the author believes that even if social/political value judgments are evitable in economic studies, intellectual value judgments are hardly evitable. In addition to intellectual value judgments, the author believes that the role of ethical or moral value judgments at the stage of selecting topics and methods for studies deserves to be at the top of the economic methodologists' agenda. It is a major aim of this paper to advance the discussion on such a topic by making a distinction between moral and non-moral normative judgments.

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