Review of Economic Philosophy

Tag: Epistemology

  • Economic evaluation in health through the prism of Foucault’s typology of Epistemes

    Abstract

    This article is part of a research project which seeks to draw on the methods and tools put forward by Michel Foucault to shed light on all areas of discussion concerning the economic assessment of health. It examines the epistemological basis of preference elicitation methods, based on welfare economics, which are used today to assess the benefits of health care. To do so, this research draws on Foucault’s episteme set out in The Order of things. More specifically the article considers that the rejection of interpersonal comparisons that foreshadowed the marginalist revolution and the transition to ordinal measures of utility during the 19th century can be explained by the shift from the classical episteme to a modern episteme. The question of the cardinal or ordinal measurement of utility is central to the economic assessment of health care. Indeed, the methods for valuing health benefits, especially using QALYs, are similar to cardinal measures, in contrast to the paradigm of the welfare economics of which they are meant to be part.

    Keywords

    , , ,

    [See the article on Cairn]

  • The Question of a Priori Knowledge in the Social Sciences : The Points of View of Simiand, Mises, and Simmel

    Abstract

    Contemporary social sciences have abandoned the quest for true, non-relativistic, a priori knowledge. On the one hand, quantitative methods and methodological positivism have by and large rejected that this type of knowledge is possible. On the other hand, qualitative methods and hermeneutical approaches, when they do not explicitly seek to obtain a posteriori knowledge, are generally characterized by the adhesion to a skeptic form of apriorism according to which the adoption of any perspective or theoretical framework is considered equally valid. This article proposes to evaluate three perspectives on the possibility of a priori knowledge in the social sciences, i.e., that of François Simiand (critique of apriorism), of Ludwig von Mises (promoter of praxeological apriorism), and of Georg Simmel (initiator of formalistic apriorism). This comparative evaluation allows to put forward the scope and limits of apriorism with respect to the acquisition of knowledge in the social sciences. It allows, in the last analysis, to restore the nobility of apriorism and to thus facilitate its eventual comeback in a form that would escape the prevailing relativism.

    Outline

    • Introduction
    • I. François Simiand et la critique de la connaissance a priori
      1. 1.1. Contre le finalisme
      2. 1.2. Le problème de l’abstraction à partir d’hypothèses non-démontrées
      3. 1.3. Vers une connaissance positive de lois a posteriori ?
    • II. Ludwig von Mises, la praxéologie et l’histoire
      1. 2.1. De la nécessité du finalisme en sciences sociales
      2. 2.2. Du statut a priori de la praxéologie
      3. 2.3. De l’insuffisance de la praxéologie et du rôle de l’histoire
      4. 2.4. La thymologie comme étude historique des fins et des motivations
    • III. Georg Simmel et l’apriorisme des formes sociales
      1. 3.1. Les formes sociales
      2. 3.2. Du caractère a priori des formes culturelles
      3. 3.3. Le relativisme
      4. 3.4. Des critères présidant au choix des formes dans l’analyse sociale
      5. 3.5. De la possible cohérence entre les approches de Mises et de Simmel
    • Conclusion

    Keywords

    , , ,

    Codes JEL : A14, B31, B41, B53, Y80

    [Read the article on Cairn]

  • L’hystérésis du taux de chômage : une analyse épistémologique

    Abstract

    Since the beginning of the 1980’s, the hypothesis of hysteresis of the unemployment rate has met a great success. However, what this hypothesis means is not very clear. After having distinguished hysteresis and persistence, we propose an interpretation of the use of this physician’s term in economics. This project requires, on the one hand, to give up the popperian prohibition to study, from an epistemological point of view, the context of discovering ; it implies, on the other hand, to focus attention on the a priori of the economic discourse. We associate the importation of the hysteresis term with the recognition by the mainstream of a presupposion which has for a long time remained characteristic of the heterodox thought: the historical dependance of equilibrium.

    Keywords

    , , ,

  • Mathematics as a tool or as a diagnostic: Reconstruction of a silent debate between Walras and Pareto

    Abstract

    This article suggests a new argument for the de-homogenization of Walras’ and Pareto’s contributions, showing that even the common analytical instrument used for the mathematical representation of general equilibrium does not have the same status. Both consider mathematics as relevant in economics, but their epistemological interpretation of it is different, and sometimes even contradictory. The paper shows that mathematics are linked to a form of determinism in Walras, whereas they are a tool to promote individual freedom in Pareto. This opposition is then connected to the opposition between mathematics as a language of nature (in Walras) and mathematics as a tool for science (in Pareto).

    JEL classification: B13, B16, B31, B41

    Keywords

    , , , ,

    [Download in Cairn]

  • Sustainable finance – which utopia?

    Abstract

    This article stems from the contradictions that may be observed between the current demand for sustainability and the current functioning of our financial system. Beginning with a discussion of the epistemological assumptions underlying financial theory, it seeks to reveal the ways in which it may be viewed as an Ideology supporting the financialization of economies and societies. In order to counterbalance this ideology, we use the Ricœurian notion of the cultural imaginary to develop a Utopia, which is referred to as Finance as a Common. The reflexivity enabled by this Utopia reveals the mental structures in which financial actors are embedded, while opening up possible pathways for the reconstruction of the financial system and the renewal of financial knowledge.

    Code JEL: G00.

    Keywords

    , , , ,

    [Download in Cairn]