Mainstream Economic Methodology

Abstract

What might reasonably be expected of a survey of mainstream economic methodology would be a statement as to the nature and role of methodology, and a discussion of how it impinged on economic practice. However, the mainstream understanding of the nature and role of methodology has been in a state of transition. Further, mainstream economics has evolved virtually independently of explicit methodological analysis. Nevertheless, the outcome of current thinking among methodologists could well be the development of a closer bond between methodology and practice. Theorists too are contemplating potentially profound methodological changes. This is therefore a particularly good time to take stock and identify the direction of change and its implications for the future of mainstream economics.¹

Most economics discussion proceeds without reference to methodology although, like prose, we use it all the time. Yet, even if there is no independent set of methodological rules we can call on, we do need some basis by which to make our practice coherent. Here, we explore how the field of methodology evolved in such a way, paradoxically, as to appear to legitimise an absence of discussion of methodology. Here again, we see the importance of a dualistic mode of thought for defining theory, this time in methodology. In the meantime, mainstream economics had been evolving in a way defined by its traditional deductivist mode of thought, but without explicit methodological appraisal. It is argued here that mainstream economics was thus risking incoherence. Methodological awareness is needed, not just to guide new economic thinking, but also to take stock of where we currently stand.