World Economics Association (WEA) Invitation

The World Economics Association (WEA) was launched on May 16, 2011. It fills a gap in the international community of economists -- the absence of a professional organization which is truly international and pluralist. The American Economic Association and other nationally based organizations provide broad associations mainly for their country’s economists. The WEA will do the same for the world's community of economists, while promoting a pluralism of approaches to economic analysis.

Read our Manifesto.

See the list of Founding Members.

To this end, the WEA will initially publish online three quarterly journals and host online conferences. Online subscriptions are free to members (a fee will be charged for print copies). The anticipated size of the WEA’s membership means that its journals will have one of the largest readerships of any in the world.

The WEA will publish the World Economics Journal, Economic Thought and the Real World Economics Review. For detailed information, including submission procedures, on each journal, click on its title.

Help economics and yourself: become a WEA member for free.

Feudalism, Fascism, Libertarianism and Economics — Book Announcement

"Eric Zuesse has written a provocative and challenging volume, though in my opinion he sometimes goes too far in his criticisms and claims. This book proposes two new postulates to replace existing ones that are at the foundation of microeconomic theory. It cites the existing body of empirical findings in economics as being the reasons for them, and it presents a strong empirical case for each of its two new postulates as being true and the one that it is replacing as being false. I regard his book as the work of a serious, committed scholar whose views deserve to be taken seriously."

— Geoffrey Harcourt

Published 9 Mar 2015 by WEA Books, 288 pages, $10.00 

This book is available to download in PDF, EPUB (for iPad etc.) and MOBI (for Kindle etc.)

From the WEA Books page:

The WEA is pleased to announce the launch of WEA Books.

All our e-books are priced at $10.00. But if you join the WEA and pay a voluntary annual membership fee of $25, $50 or $150 you will, in the year following payment, be entitled to 3, 7, or 22 free e-books.

Most books are available to download in PDF, EPUB (iPad) and MOBI (Kindle) formats.

Real-World Economics Review Blog
Feudalism, Fascism, Libertarianism and Economics by Eric Zuesse
Editor

World Economics Association Progress Report

I previously posted an invitation to join the World Economics Association, which was launched on May 16, 2011. Here is a progress report.

World Economics Association - Progress Report

Dear Member of the World Economics Association,

The WEA is now two months old. So I thought I should give you a brief report on how things stand.

Membership is now over 6,000. Donations total nearly £13,000.

The Journals

Seven of the ten co-editorships of the WEA ’s two new journals have been filled. These are as follows.

Economic Thought

John Latsis , UK, Reading Univeristy

Annalisa Rosselli , Italy , Rome La Sapienza

Alejandro Nadal , Mexico , El Colegio de Mexico 


World Economics Journal

Zhu Andong , China , Tsinghua University , Beijing

Jayati Ghosh , India , Jawaharial Nehru University

Norbert Häring , Germany , Handelsblatt

Michael Hudson , USA , University of Missouri at Kansas City

We have chosen and are in the process of purchasing an online journal software system for the WEA ’s three journals. It should be up and running by late August. When it is, you will be notified so that you can submit papers. We will also at that time be looking for volunteers to perform various tasks involved in the production of the journals. Meanwhile the editors of the World Economic Journal have already begun work at putting together the first issue. My WEA work commitments have delayed the publication of issue no. 57 of the real-world economics review, but it should be out soon.

Editorial Boards have been formed for the three journals and are listed here for the WEJ, here for ET, and here for the RWER.

Online Conferences: Volunteers needed

This link to our Guidelines for Conferences explains the anticipated conference setup. The Guidelines are open to amendment. We are currently investigating online conference software. It is likely that we will opt for a system that is a module of our journal software. In any case we need:

- 3 or 4 people to serve on the Conference Organisation Committee as described in the Guidelines,.

- Conference Leaders as also described in the Guidelines. This role especially concerns people who have a topic or set of topics that they would like to make the focus of a conference.

- one or more people with a bit of IT knowledge may also be needed.

Executive Committee

Progress with establishing the World Economics Association reached the point where it needed a top layer of formal structure in addition to its legal status as a Community Interest Company (CIC) under UK law. A formal constitution with procedures for electing officers and Executive Committee members is being prepared, but things are not yet far enough advanced for its adoption and enactment. Therefore we have recruited an interim Executive Committee. Its members are currently as follows.

Juan Carlos Moreno Brid , Mexico , UN Economic Com. for Latin America and the Caribbean

C. P. Chandrasekhar , India , Jawaharlal Nehru University

Ping Chen , China , Peking University and Fudan University

Edward Fullbrook , UK , Real-World Economics Review

James K. Galbraith , USA , University of Texas at Austin

Grazia Ietto-Gillies , Italy / UK , London South Bank University

Steve Keen , Australia , University of Western Sydney

Tony Lawson , UK , Cambridge University

Peter Radford , USA , Radford Free Press

Dani Rodrik , USA , Harvard University

Your ideas for the development of the WEA are welcome.

I and my co-organizers Peter Radford, Norbert Häring , Grazia Ietto-Gillies,Vicki Harris and Valerie Radford, who have worked hard for many months, thank you for your support. We hope that you will continue to spread the word among your colleagues and encourage them to join the World Economics Association. Six thousand members is an excellent beginning.

Edward Fullbrook

New issue of WEA Commentaries

Download new issue.

Real-World Economics Review Blog
New issue of WEA Commentaries

“Finance as Warfare”, Michael Hudson’s new book

Timely title.

Real-World Economics Review Blog
“Finance as Warfare”, Michael Hudson’s new book

Published by WEA eBooks 1 July 2015

Available for purchase at WEA Books

Modern Economics Versus Islamic Economics — Asad Zaman

Stuart Birks publishes WEA Commentaries. This is a project of the World Economic Association, which is the World’s largest organization of heterodox economists, who aim to challenge the dominant, mainstream, orthodoxy in economics. In the latest issue of the commentaries, Stuart has published extracts from my article on “Islam’s Gift: An Economy of Spiritual Development“. Initial segment of these extracts is as follows:

An Islamic WorldView
Modern Economics Versus Islamic Economics
Asad Zaman | Vice Chancellor, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics and former Director General, International Institute of Islamic Economics, International Islamic University Islamabad

RWER — Steve Keen's New Book – Developing an economics for the post-crisis world

Developing an economics for the post-crisis worldSteve KeenPublished 2 March 2015 by WEA Books  – price: $10

The veracity of mainstream economics has been called into question in the years since the economic crisis began. But the questioning of economics precedes the crisis, and not by merely years but arguably ever since 1898, when Thorstein Veblen published his brilliant paper “Why is Economics not an Evolutionary Science?” But Veblen’s critique fell on the deaf ears of the mainstream, and was unknown to the public. Only in the fringes of academic economists did Veblen’s words, and the spirit of rebellion he encouraged, live on.

Economics came under challenge again in the 1930s, and this time Keynes led the charge against an orthodoxy that, six years after the Great Depression began, had no idea what caused it, or how to overcome it. But Keynes’s challenge was largely deflected by Hicks’s reinterpretation of Keynes, and the taxonomic economics that Veblen hoped to defeat was rebuilt after the challenge of the Great Depression and the World War had ended.

In 2007, the global economy experienced its greatest crisis since the Great Depression, and once again, mainstream economics failed to anticipate the crisis, and even after it has apparently passed – in the Anglo-Saxon world at least – once again, can provide no explanation of why it happened in the first place.   What is different this time around is that there is a publicly accessible outlet for critical voices, and it has been around – in various guises – for 15 years. What was first known as PAECON (the Protest against Autistic ECONomics) and is now known as the Real World Economics Review was established by Edward Fullbrook in 2000 in response to protests by French students against the unworldly theorems they were forced to learn in the French economics curriculum. When the financial crisis hit in late 2007, the Real World Economics Review was already there, ready to provide an outlet for critical economists, and intent on getting their views to the public.

This short book provides the articles that I have published in RWER over the last fifteen years – starting with the first in July 2001. The topics covered include methodology, microeconomics, and the monetary approach to macroeconomics that I have been developing – along with many other non-mainstream economists – over the last 20 years.

You may purchase ($10) and download this book in PDF, EPUB, and MOBI formats here 

RWER Real-World Economics Review 

Modern Monetary Theory — Asad Zaman

This continues from the previous post on Post-Keynesian Response. A large number of contributions from different areas need to be integrated to build an economics for the 21st Century. For an acknowledgement of the failure of 20th Century Macro from one of its architects, see Romer’s Trouble With Macro. This post explains Modern Monetary Theory briefly.

WEA Pedagogy Blog
Modern Monetary Theory
Asad Zaman | Vice Chancellor, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics and former Director General, International Institute of Islamic Economics, International Islamic University Islamabad

Asad Zaman — Three Goals for Pedagogical Change

First Obstacle: Normative Positive Distinction

Second Obstacle: A-historical Methodology 

Third Obstacle: Free Markets generate best possible economic outcomes 

Summary: As discussed, there is a huge amount of work necessary to reform the economics curriculum to make it people friendly, instead of capital friendly. Three necessary initial steps have been outlined above. There are many other ways of proceeding, and the purpose of this blog is to initiate a discussion on how to make pedagogical changes for improved economic outcomes.

WEA Pedagogy Blog
Three Goals for Pedagogical Change
Asad Zaman

The assumptions, including methodological, make the neoliberal approach to economics as the basis of the market state propaganda for capital as the dominant factor with all other factors serving its efficiency, which only a market free of regulation can provide according to the myth.

Maria Alejandra Madi — Economics and Trust

Keynes on trust needed to counter uncertainty.

WEA Pedagogy Blog
Economics and Trust
Maria Alejandra Madi

Asad Zaman — Methodology of Modern Economics

My paper is a survey of the huge amount of solid empirical evidence against the utility maximization hypothesis that is at the core of all microeconomics currently being taught today in Economics textbooks at universities all over the world. It is obviously important, because if what it says is true, the entire field of microeconomics needs to be re-constructed from scratch. Nonetheless, it was summarily rejected by a large number of top journals, before being eventually published by Jack Reardon as: ” The Empirical Evidence Against Neoclassical Utility Theory: A Review of the Literature,” in International Journal of Pluralism and Economics Education, Vol. 3, No. 4, 2012, pp. 366-414. Speaking metaphorically, my paper documents the solid evidence that the earth is a round sphere in world where educational institutions teach the widely held belief that the earth is flat. Readers of RWER blog will recall that when challenged on the failure of macroeconomics after the Global Financial Crisis, economists retreated to the position that while macro theory may be in a bad shape, at least Microeconomics is solidly grounded. My paper blows this claim out of the water. As a result, nothing is left of Micro and Micro, and of economics as whole. This supports my earlier claim that a Radical Paradigm Shift is required to make progress — patching up existing theories cannot work...

The central question remains of what is to be done. A complex response which requires coordination on multiple fronts is required. The first step has to be the development of a coherent alternative. I have developed a two semester micro coursewhich starts with the Anti-Textbook of Hill & Myatt, and follows up by using two main tools OPPOSED to maximization and equilbrium. Maximization is replaced by behavioral heuristics, which allow operation in environments with genuine uncertainty. Maximization is actually IMPOSSIBLE in uncertain environments. If I have to choose between actions a and b but the outcome to me depends on unknown state of natures and unknown acts of other agents then maximization is not possible. I cannot calculate which of the two actions will yield greater utility because the outcome depends on many thing I do not know, and cannot learn. SIMILARLY, if we equip all agents with heuristic behavior and try to compute what will happen, this can only be done within an Agent Based Model using computer simulations — which will generally lead to disequilibrium outcomes. Using these two tools to replace the central micro tools, one can go quite far in replacing standard micro with sensible alternatives....

WEA Pedagogy Blog
Methodology of Modern Economics

Asad Zaman | Vice Chancellor, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics and former Director General, International Institute of Islamic Economics, International Islamic University Islamabad

Asad Zaman — Modern Monetary Theory

The starting point of MMT is that our thinking about money is conditioned by the view that money is based on gold, which leads us to ignore the radical differences between gold-backed money and “fiat” money, which comes into existence by government decree, and does not require any backing. With a gold-backed currency, the concept of a government deficit makes sense – the government must have gold, in order to spend it. However, with a fiat currency, a deficit must always be self-imposed; the government chooses not to print money in order to pay its obligations.The idea that the government does not have money to fund social welfare or investment is wrong, because the government creates money by sovereign fiat, and can always print as much money as it likes. MMT raises the question of why the government should impose taxes on citizens to generate revenue – why not just print the money instead? Readers who have been conditioned by economic theories will eagerly proffer the standard answer: because this will lead to inflation! But this answer is neither sufficient, nor satisfactory.

Based on his experiences as Governor of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, Daniel Tarullo has written that at present we do not have a working theory of inflation. Similarly, Joseph Stiglitz has written that the stable relationship between money and inflation broke down in the 1980’s, leaving us with no reliable guide to monetary policy. 

Asad Zaman is teaching MMT in Pakistan.

WEA Pedagogy Blog
Modern Monetary Theory

Asad Zaman | Vice Chancellor of the Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, Islamabad, and formerly Director General of International Institute of Islamic Economics, International Islamic University, Islamabad

also of interest

Moneyness
The credit theory of money
JP Koning

also

Real-World Economics Review Blog

Uploaded: ‘The role of money in economic theory’ by Wesley Claire Mitchell (1916)

Merijn Knibbe

ABC’s of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) — Asad Zaman

I was overwhelmed by the level of ignorance displayed by distinguished economist Raghuram Rajan in his article entitled “How Much Debt Is Too Much?” published recently in Project Syndicate on Nov 30, 2020. I had meant to write a critique of the article, but to do so requires starting from the very beginning. In this post, I go over some basic MMT concepts, in order to prepare the ground for this critique. There are now many good videos explaining these basics. I will go over six questions discussed in the first ten minutes of “Modern Money & Public Purpose 1: The Historical Evolution of Money and Debt” by Professor L Randall Wray. Learning the answers to these questions provides foundations for understanding MMT which are evidently missing in Rajan’s paper....

WEA Pedagogy Blog
ABC’s of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT)
Asad Zaman | Vice Chancellor, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics and former Director General, International Institute of Islamic Economics, International Islamic University Islamabad

Bill Mitchell — UBI advocates ignore the dynamic efficiencies of full employment

I have written about the concept of dynamic efficiency before. The most recent blog post on this theme was – The ‘truth sandwich’ and the impacts of neoliberalism (June 19, 2018) – which examined how social mobility across generations has been declining as a result of the decades of entrenched unemployment driven by neoliberal austerity biases. I also outlined the proposition in this blog post – US labour market reality debunks mainstream view about structural impediments (January 15, 2018). The point of all this is that establishing high pressure labour markets brings about more than just workers who want to work having jobs. It brings other major benefits that workers can enjoy and forces firms and governments to manage their affairs differently from when there is entrenched unemployment. The UBI proponents never really understand that point as they continue to surrender to the proposition that mass unemployment is inevitable and all the governments should do is keep people alive with some guaranteed income. All these dynamic efficiency gains are then not realised and capital has the run of the field....

Getting into the nitty gritty.

Framing the debate in terms of UBI or JG, presuming that the choice is binary, involves confusing categories. They are different programs addressing different issues, and they are not mutually exclusive as a binary division of single bounded set "workers," having only two subsets that exclude each other.

This is largely due to failure to appreciate fully the JG position, and as a result mounting attacks on a straw man. Since this position has been set forth amply in the literature, such behavior is unprofessional.

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
UBI advocates ignore the dynamic efficiencies of full employment
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

See also

Jeremy Corbyn’s speech this morning raises a big question in economics that won’t get the attention it deserves: is there a trade-off between static and dynamic efficiency?

Stumbling and Mumbling
Corbyn's neglected question
Chris Dillow | Investors Chronicle

See also

The issue of UBI and JG is not only economic but runs the gamut of the social, political and economic spectrum, influencing all aspects of society.

In the new millennium, the proliferation of financial assets, with unstable economic growth, has given way to widespread to precarious jobs, income gaps and weaker welfare programs. The same policies that have obliterated social services and kept labour cheap have supported the expansion of short-termism and new global business models in the context of deregulated capitalism.

Besides, the onset of the 21st century represents a new political age overwhelmed by the violation of democratic ideals of political equality and social peace. Indeed, democracy has been allowing for election to office but not to power (Madi, 2015). And, as a consequence, policy makers might give priority to their sponsors instead of the needs of citizens – decent work and income equality.

In truth, the current trends in global capital accumulation and production have shaped a scenario where unemployment, job instability and fragile conditions of social protection increased (Stiglitz, 2011). First, labour-saving technologies have reduced the demand for many middle-class, blue-collar jobs. Second, globalization has created a global marketplace, confronting expensive unskilled workers with cheap unskilled workers overseas and favouring outsourcing practices. Third, social changes have also played a role in the labor market changes, such as the decline of unions. Four, political decisions are influenced by the top 1% who favor policies that increase income inequality.
All these trends do reveal issues of current power, politics and economics in a social context where democratic institutions are being threatened....

Very short review of Robert Kuttner, Can Democracy Survive Global Capitalism?, WW Norton, 2018

WEA Pedagogy Blog

On global capitalism and the survival of democracy
Maria Alejandra Madi

Asad Zaman — Simple Model Explains Complex Keynesian Concepts

Not MMT, but you may find this of interest.

In the context of the radical Macroeconomics Course I am teaching, I was very unhappy with the material available which tries to explain what Keynes is saying. In attempting to explain it better, I constructed an extremely simple model of a primitive agricultural economy. This model has a lot of pedagogical value in that it can demonstrate many complex phenomenon in very simple terms. In particular, Keynesian, Marxists, Classical and Neo-Classical concepts can be illustrated and compared within our model. We will show the failure of all neoclassical concepts of labor, Supply and Demand, equality of marginal product, value theory — the whole she-bang — in an intuitive and easy to understand plausible model of a simple economy.

WEA Pedagogy Blog
Simple Model Explains Complex Keynesian Concepts
Asad Zaman | Vice Chancellor, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics and former Director General, International Institute of Islamic Economics, International Islamic University Islamabad

Asad Zaman — Meta-Theory and Pluralism in the Methodology of Polanyi

Karl Polanyi's pluralist theory of knowledge applied to economics.

WEA Pedagogy Blog
Meta-Theory and Pluralism in the Methodology of Polanyi
Asad Zaman | Vice Chancellor of the Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, Islamabad