In the face of claims that economics is increasingly driven merely by fashion, this paper draws out certain similarities and differences between two self-consciously progressive and developmental research programmes--namely the LSE approach to econometric modelling and critical realism in...

Despite recent advances, economic methodology has found it difficult to transcend certain positivist premises and concerns. The authors argue that developments in philosophy and social theory under the heading of critical realism are particularly significant with respect to overcoming these...

The initial argument developed in this paper is that a wants-based conception of the objectives of policy, clearly operative in his broadcasting studies, together with the acceptance of certain assumed properties of the competitive process, tightly constrain Coase's work. At times, for example,...