Thursday, May 12, 2016

David F. Ruccio — Thought control in economics

No matter how many stories I tell them about thought control in economics, students and colleagues in other disciplines simply don’t believe me.
They don’t understand the restrictions on the professors who are hired, the narrow range of methods and perspectives published in the leading economics journals, the limits on research projects that actually receive funding, or even the surveillance of what should be taught to students in basic undergraduate and graduate economics classes. It’s beyond their imagination that mainstream economists do all they can—within their departments and in the wider discipline—to make sure other approaches (often referred to as heterodox economics or noneconomics) are displaced to (and, in many cases, beyond) the margins.…
Neoliberal conspiracy, coincidence, or...?

David Ruccio survived a purge at Notre Dame only because he had tenure. But the formerly heterodox economics department, similar to UMASS Amherst and UMKC, was converted to conventional economics and a separate department was instituted for "other."

Occasional Links & Commentary
Thought control in economics
David F. Ruccio | Professor of Economics, University of Notre Dame

See also

There's a reason for all this.

Capturing the surplus

2 comments:

Simsalablunder said...

Thought control isn't only within economics. Fake economic arguments are constantly used top hinder diversity within research. We can't afford it together with what is it good for is used to stop research as well as already ongoing research.

I remember a woman being smeared in media in the eighties for her research. She did research about kitchen environment or something similar. A right wing think tanks gave the story to right wing media who heavily mocked her personally and her research as plain stupidity, a complete waist of time and money, being totally useless etc.

Turned out IKEA and other companies used her findings to develop kitchen environment. They got it for free btw.

Random said...

Yup Sim. They have made scientific research, always competitive and tough, show its mean side.