Cambridge Economics: A place, a people, an academic community and its Palgrave Companion (original) (raw)
Related papers
Six Titans of Cambridge Economics: a review article
Cambridge Journal of Economics, 2011
Six volumes in the Great Thinker in Economics Series were chosen by the Editors for this review, which focuses on The Cambridge School of Economics, so very different from the mainstream theory of general economic equilibrium which gives formal expression to Lionel Robbins’ famous definition of the subject as the allocation of scarce means among alternative uses. In recognition of a distinct Cambridge School, the authors of these volumes present a variety of arguments within which three overlapping themes can be discerned: the relationship between ethics and economics; the role of stocks and flows in economic analysis; and the epistemic problem surrounding the role of creativity, which has eluded the skills of formalists. The once pervasive influence of Alfred Marshall, John Maynard Keynes, Dennis Robertson, Piero Sraffa, Joan Robinson and Nicholas Kaldor can only be recovered with some such set of general themes in mind.
Making economics more relevant: an interview with Geoffrey Hodgson
Erasmus journal for philosophy and economics, 2010
He is editor-inchief of the Journal of Institutional Economics and a member of the Academy of Social Sciences in the UK. He has published over 120 articles in academic journals and his books include Economics and institutions (1988), Economics and evolution (1993), Economics and utopia (1999), How economics forgot history (2001), The evolution of institutional economics (2004), and (with Thorbjørn Knudsen) Darwin's conjecture: the search for general principles of social and economic evolution (2010). Professor Hodgson is widely known for his extensive work on institutional economics, and his numerous contributions to a broad variety of topics in heterodox economics and social theory. His current research focuses on the theoretical and methodological foundations of institutional and evolutionary economics. In particular he is interested in the application of Darwinian principles to socio-economic evolution, the conditions underlying increasing socio-economic complexity, and the impact of increasing complexity in capitalist development. During a visit to Erasmus University Rotterdam in November 2009 Professor Hodgson granted EJPE the opportunity to discuss many of these issues extensively. The interview ranged widely over such topics as the relationship between institutional and neoclassical economics; the methodological challenges in institutional economics; the potential role of biological and evolutionary ideas in the social sciences; and the role of economics and economists in the recent economic crisis and how the profession should change.
2020
Beginning in the 1950s and lasting well into the 1970s, the Cambridge Capital Controversy (CCC) refers to the economic disputes on the role of capital goods in neoclassical economic theory. Specifically, the controversies explored three particular issues: 1. The value of capital goods in an industrial, capitalist, free-market economy; 2. Joan Robinson's critiques on the ability of equilibrium to analyze capital growth and accumulation processes; and 3. The concepts of reswitching and reverse capital deepening. After a thorough introduction of the fundamental topics, this paper analyzes three distinct topics as case studies. The studies will attempt to establish a line of reasoning and introduce the main actors' perspectives (either neoclassical or Keynesian/post-Keynesian). Given recent argument developments surrounding the CCC, the paper will also update readers on the second "phase" of the debate between neo-Ricardian and neo-Walrasian economists. The paper's primary purpose is to extend the CCC's importance in classroom, graduate, and research environments due to its critical implications on neoclassical theory. Furthermore, the paper will base the CCC as a foundation for exploring the relationship of demand with the natural rate of economic growth.
The Cambridge Economics Tripos 1903-55 and the Training of Economists
The Manchester School, 2000
The performance of students during the ¢rst 50 years of the Cambridge Economics Tripos is examined. Students are grouped according to the Parts completed, and an assessment is made of the relative performance. A general comparison of college performance is also made. Students of Part I only are shown to achieve poor results; students taking both Parts do not consistently perform better than those taking only Part II. The results are placed in the context of Marshall's intention that the Tripos should be a three-year training in economics, and also in the context of Harry Johnson's critique of Cambridge economics, which the results generally support.
The History of Economics from 1974 to 2014
Economics students have a rather fantastic view of the history of their science. Their professors have taught them hate for “mainstream” economics, which does not make sense. Obviously, mainstream is (by definition) what is being taught to undergraduates. The purpose of this paper is to make clear exactly what is now and has been for forty years the mainstream of economic science.
Working with Archives: Cambridge Economics Through the MagnifyingGlass
Research in economics using documentary archives provides clearer interpretations about the ideas and their development throughout time, in the context of the writing process in relation to the interlocutors and antagonists, and the nature of the problems addressed. This document presents examples of works with tough drafts, correspondence, tables of contents, notes, and related material of four economists of the “Cambridge Group”: Piero Sraffa, Richard Kahn, Joan Robinson, and John Maynard Keynes. In each case the findings and importance of the research done in the files are described.
Richard M. Goodwin: A Pioneer in the Field of Economic Dynamics between the Two Cambridges
SSRN Electronic Journal, 2009
In the attempt to answer three (interrelated) questions, we concentrate on a crucial step in Goodwin's (RMG) life: his move from Cambridge, Mass. to Cambridge, UK. Why did RMG not get a permanent position at Harvard? How did RMG reach the decision to settle down in Cambridge, UK? Why was it that RMG never finished the book on economic dynamics he had started to write at Harvard? In answering these questions we show that the material available in the Goodwin Archive at the University of Siena is invaluable and adds much to the 'known story'.