Once economics came to be understood as the scientific investigation of the operation of markets, economic theorists pushed ethical and metaphysical concerns outside their realm of study. After the separation, the claims of Christian theology had no more jurisdiction over the discipline of...

This paper discusses the following two hypotheses. The first one is based on the epistemological proposal which we have named the principle of discontinuity. It asserts that certain developments in the history of economic thought involve theoretical breaks which can only be fully explained by...

The meaning of Methodological Individualism has been one of the most diversified concepts and is one of the basic methodological principles of the social sciences. It indicates an orderly, repeatable and self-correcting research procedure whose object of study is individuals and their set of...

The present paper considers the implications of the postulate that the activities of scientists constitute complex phenomena in the sense associated with the methodological writings of the Nobel Prize-winning Austrian economist, methodologist, and political philosopher, F.A. Hayek. Although...

Although Ronald Coase is popularly associated with the Chicago School, his approach belongs to the late nineteenth and early twentieth century British tradition. In this essay, we address whether the Coasean or traditional British methodology can offer improvements to current methods. Current...

Was the Keynesian message alive during the second half of the XXth Century, or was it betrayed by his followers? This article in the fields of the history of economic thought and methodology contrasts the Scientific Research Programmes (SRPs), a Lakatosian concept, of Keynes in The General...

In terms of economic methodology, Friedman's most well-known contribution is his 1953 essay, “The Methodology of Positive Economics.” This important contribution has overshadowed his earlier contribution to economic methodology, entitled “Lerner on the Economics of Control” (1947)....

During the heyday of discussion about Milton Friedman's 1953 methodology paper, Samuelson's operationalism was often discussed as the primary competitor to Friedman's position. Although Friedman's paper continues to be discussed - albeit at a steadily decreasing rate - Samuelson's account of...

This paper concerns a neglected aspect of Lucas's work: his methodological writings, published and unpublished. Particular attention is paid to his views on the relationship between theory and ideology. I start by setting out Lucas's non-standard conception of theory: to him, a theory and a...