[OPE-L:5728] Re: Re: why are we on this list?

From: Rakesh Narpat Bhandari (rakeshb@Stanford.EDU)
Date: Fri Jun 01 2001 - 11:20:32 EDT


re Jerry's 5725

>Re Rakesh's [5712]:
>
>>  Is it funny to ridicule someone who thinks Marx > got basically right?
>
>All those who reject _all_ authority figures should
>agree that no one should be immune from being
>the 'target' of humorous remarks.

OK, ha, ha. I kinda responded in kind with a comment about the hare 
krishnas, but Jerry  you refuse to acknowledge that it is obvious 
that Gil, Steve and Ajit think of value theoretic marxists as 
charlatans who need to be taken out root and branch. I suppose this 
seething contempt has not been obvious to you over six years of this 
list.




>
>
>>  Why is that funny when we have had to pay--for > example, we marxists
>>  don't have mentors at many of the top schools,
>>  certainly not mentors
>>  who could help us get jobs (take for example
>>  Harvard, Princeton and
>>  Stanford--Duncan left here years ago).
>
>This has, imo, very little -- if anything -- to do
>with critiques of Marx that charge logical
>inconsistency.

These supposed logical problems have not been the grounds for rooting 
marxist political economy, based on Marx's Capital, from the academy?



>Indeed, _all_ heterodox economists
>have a similar problem (in all but a few select
>schools.) I.e. _anyone_ who adheres to a
>perspective that is not marginalist is considered
>to be an 'outsider'.

Sure they have a similar problem; there are only so many so called 
radicals you need to root marxism out of the academy. But we have a 
different estimation of what the true function of these other 
heterodox traditions is. Marx carried out an extensive critique of 
other socialisms. And the neoricardian postkeynesian theory is the 
underpinning for a form of state socialism which would have been 
subject to massive critique by Marx.



>   Even _for marginalists_, they
>might have problems getting jobs if they specialize
>in certain 'arcane' areas -- especially history of
>economic thought, economic history, or economic
>philosophy.

Well they will surely find mentors and networks.

>
>
>>  but if scientific
>>  criticism were allowed in political economy, i
>>  think these marx  critics could easily be proven
>>  to be weak and defenseless. they
>>  criticize and ridicule from within the protected
>>  confines of the bourgeois academy.
>
>So 'scientific criticism' is not allowed in political
>economy?  There are certainly a bunch of
>journals, and radical publishing houses, that
>might be willing to publish such 'scientific
>criticism' though.  Thus, it _is_ allowed (in
>at least some forums)  ... if  one actually has
>'scientific criticism'.

Again I think it's astonishing that you and others won't admit that 
the bourgeoisification of any radical journal is always a live 
threat, always in the process of almost completing itself. But we 
just have a different sense of the constraints on scholarship.



>.
>>  it didn't lead to much in the engagements with
>>  Freeman on this list.
>
>So Steve is to blame if Alan doesn't want to, or
>have time to, engage him in a discussion on
>non-linear dynamics, etc.?

I think Steve's seething contempt turned Alan F off, but I hope that 
he speaks for himself at some point.



>
>>  Wait! Mongiovi wrote a long critique of TSS
>>  which in many ways came
>>  down to the methodology of comparative statics. > He is trying to bury  a
>rival school; I think he
>>  should defend his critique openly in
>  > debate with Kliman, Freeman, Ernst or others.
>
>He _did_ defend his critique openly (and the fur
>was flying! ... although Gary remained calm
>throughout) at the IWGVT this Spring.

I would be calm if I had the entire institutional weight of 
equilibrium economics behind me too.



>   As for
>OPE-L, no one from a TSS perspective has
>yet challenged him on that critique on-list ...
>even though (of course!) that is their right.

I think the contempt which is so palpable--see Ajit's last 
comments--finally got to them. Carchedi left this list very early.

Rakesh



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