Back to the big picture
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Journal Title
Journal of Economic Methodology
ISSN
1350-178X
Publisher
Taylor & Francis
Pages
1-6
Language
en
Type
Article
This Version
AM
Metadata
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Alexandrova, A., Northcott, R., & Wright, J. (2021). Back to the big picture. Journal of Economic Methodology, 1-6. https://doi.org/10.1080/1350178x.2020.1868772
Abstract
The history of methodology of economics has seen two different strategies. At times, methodologists have analyzed economics as a whole, ascribing to it a single epistemic approach and appealing to a standard against which this approach can be evaluated. At other times, they have pursued a more circumscribed enquiry, into how some specific technique common in economics can achieve one or more epistemic goal. Label the first strategy big-picture, and the second strategy fine-grained. Roughly speaking, the big-picture strategy prevailed up to the 1990s, but in the last thirty years the dominant mode has been fine-grained. We argue that recent developments in philosophy of science and in economics warrant a return to big-picture – but now reinvented. It should not inherit the old presumption that economics has a single method, or that there is a single criterion of ‘science’. Instead, it should focus on a new question, already intensely debated within the profession: is the organization of economics healthy and appropriate? This question is big-picture. Although any answer to it must ride on the back of fine-grained work, fine-grained work alone is not enough. It is also ripe for explicit and systematic examination by methodologists because a proper answer requires the skills and knowledge of our community. We illustrate how a revived big-picture strategy is fruitful for two controversies: how much effort to devote to rational choice modeling, and how economics is socially organized.
Sponsorship
Jack Wright is a supported by the project QUALITY, funded by the European Research Council under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Framework Programme for Research and Innovation (ERC grant agreement no. 715530).
Embargo Lift Date
2023-08-14
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/1350178x.2020.1868772
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/309256
Rights
All rights reserved