- Written by: Kamran Mofid
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Today's neoclassical economist is an emperor with no clothes
‘Economics is a failing discipline doing great harm – so let's rethink it.’
‘Something is killing conventional economics and it’s probably an inside job. Reliance on abstract mathematics and absurd assumptions has brought the discipline into disrepute, even if politics and policy are guided by the ghosts of its teaching.’-Andrew Simms*
Photo: transitionvoice.com
‘An economist is an expert who will know tomorrow why the things he predicted yesterday didn't happen today.’-Laurence J. Peter
‘The Non-exemplary Lives of Economists’
By Prof. Branko Milanovic Via The Globalist.
In a recent email from The Globalist, the following paragraph caught my attention and imagination. What I began to read was music to my ears:
‘In today’s feature, Branco Milanovic, one of the world's preeminent experts on inequality, raises a tantalizing question: Can social scientists who often lead privileged lives in rich societies – and thus have limited cultural knowledge – really produce breakthroughs in social sciences?
‘After all, their ultimate proposition is that they can find a way to figure out how people behave under conditions that the social scientists have never experienced themselves —nor, for that matter, has anyone they know, Branko argues.’...More on this a bit later.
Nota bene
I cannot tell you enough how deeply and strongly this has resonated with me. Believe me, what I wish to note below, is nothing but the gospel truth.
From day one, when as a mature and married student (with a life story to tell already), I had embarked on my first degree in economics, all those years ago, in mid 1970s, I began to wonder how on earth the great majority of the professors who were teaching me, or the authors of the text books they were recommending us to buy at significantly unjustified high prices, could have any answers to the pertinent questions they were asking or trying to answer!
To my mind, they had no story to tell. They had no life journey to share. There was no evidence of any encounter with other cultures, religions, civilisations and peoples. How boring that was, I thought!!
They never told us who they were, what they were or what they believed in. All we knew was that they got their first degree from this or that ‘prestigious’ university. They then carried on to postgraduate studies at another even more ‘prestigious’ university. All these enabled them to get a teaching post at this or that university.
Then, they had to publish articles that nobdoy could understand, or indeed, was interested to read, at ‘prestigious’ journals. These were followed by writing similarly boring and totally meaningless books for publication by ‘prestigious’ publishers. All these sacrifices for getting their ‘prestigious’ tenures!! ...And the rest is history.
Now, reverting back to the said article ‘The Non-exemplary Lives of Economists’
‘Recently I read, rather by accident than design, the short lives of several contemporary economists. What struck me was their bareness. The lives sounded like CVs.
Actually, there was hardly any difference between their CVs and their lives — to the extent that I could tell.
C.V.’s and Yah-Dee-Dah
The lives (i.e., CVs) typically went like this.
He/she graduated from a very prestigious university as the best in their class; had many offers from equally prestigious universities; became an assistant professor at X, tenured at Y; wrote a seminal paper on Z when he/she was at W.
Served on one or two government panels. Moved to another prestigious university. Wrote another seminal paper. Then wrote a book. And then…this went on and on.
Cookie cutter social scientists
You could create a single template, and just input the name of the author, the titles of the papers and perhaps only slight differences in age for each of them.
I was wondering: How can people who had lived such boring lives — mostly in one or two countries, with the knowledge of at most two languages, having read only the literature in one language, having travelled only from one campus to another, and perhaps from one hiking resort to another — have meaningful things to say about social sciences with all their fights, corruption, struggles, wars, betrayals and cheating?
Had they been physicists or chemists, it would not matter. You do not have to lead a personally interesting life in order to understand how atoms move. But perhaps you do need it to understand what moves humans (cf. Vico)
The big question
Can you have a boring life and be a first-rate social scientist?
To some extent, probably yes. You can be very smart and figure out how people behave under conditions that you have never yourself experienced—nor has anyone you know.
I cannot say it is impossible. But I think it is unlikely.
Different when it happens to others than to me
It is in human nature, however smart we may be, to understand certain things or to look at different and new aspects of an issue only when we face the problem ourselves.
I think we have all experienced that. Faced theoretically with a given problem, we can provide a perfectly reasonable and coherent answer and even explain the choices well.
But then faced by the same problem in our own lives, we quickly find out that such a well-reasoned answer was only partially correct.
I could never have imagined!
The answer failed to consider several secondary issues, many conditions and constraints that, in the abstract case, we either ignored, assumed away, or most likely just never thought about. Or never imagined.
Orderly and boring lives are a privilege of rich and orderly societies. We all (perhaps except when we are 25) wish to lead such lives.
Privileged orderly and boring lives are limited
But they are also very limited lives: the range of emotions and choices that we experience is narrow.
We may want to have as our teachers in social science people who had to drink poison to make a point (Socrates), or were jailed and tortured (Machiavelli), or were executed on the orders of a national assembly (Condorcet), or banished and killed by a totalitarian regime (Kondratieff).
Or we might want those who had to flee their governments and reinvent themselves (Marx), or move into incendiary politics (Weber), or migrate to another language and continent (Schumpeter, Hayek, Kuznets, Leontief), or experience the thrill of forbidden pleasures (Keynes).
But if our life is a C.V., can we understand human choices and human nature — a precondition for being a great social scientist?
Can the orderly and bored produce breakthroughs?
By asking that question, are we not asking whether well-behaved individuals in orderly and rich societies can really produce breakthroughs in social sciences?
Or will their lessons remain circumscribed only by orderly and rich societies and by orderly and boring people — and not carry over to the rest of the world?
In other words, to use Plutarch’s term, do we need exemplary lives for greatness in social sciences?’
Read the original article HERE
……
And, yes, history continued. I, too, got my PhD in Economics and became a lecturer, and similar to those who had taught me my tools of trade, I, too, became boring and detached! That is, until I saw the light and became wise!
“From 1980 onwards, for the next twenty years, I taught economics in universities, enthusiastically demonstrating how economic theories provided answers to problems of all sorts. I got quite carried away by the beauty, the sophisticated elegance, of complicated mathematical models and theories. But gradually I started to have an empty feeling.
“I began to ask fundamental questions of myself. Why did I never talk to my students about compassion, dignity, comradeship, solidarity, happiness, spirituality – about the meaning of life? We never debated the biggest questions. Who are we? Where have we come from? Where are we going to?
“I told them to create wealth, but I did not tell them for what reason. I told them about scarcity and competition, but not about abundance and co-operation. I told them about free trade, but not about fair trade; about GNP – Gross National Product – but not about GNH – Gross National Happiness. I told them about profit maximisation and cost minimisation, about the highest returns to the shareholders, but not about social consciousness, accountability to the community, sustainability and respect for creation and the creator. I did not tell them that, without humanity, economics is a house of cards built on shifting sands.
“These conflicts caused me much frustration and alienation, leading to heartache and despair. I needed to rediscover myself and real-life economics. After a proud twenty-year or so academic career, I became a student all over again. I would study theology, philosophy and ethics, disciplines nobody had taught me when I was a student of economics and I did not teach my own students when I became a teacher of economics.
“It was at this difficult time that I came to understand that I needed to bring spirituality, compassion, ethics and morality back into economics itself, to make this dismal science once again relevant to and concerned with the common good.”- Excerpts from What might an Economy for the Common Good look like?
And now, as a “Recovered” economist, who has seen the “Light” and hopefully is now wiser than before, I believe I can shed some light on this matter.
‘These days I am inspired by the “Real” and “True” Adam Smith, known the world over as the Father of New Economics. We should recall the wisdom of Adam Smith, who was a great moral philosopher first and foremost. In 1759, sixteen years before his famous Wealth of Nations, he published The Theory of Moral Sentiments, which explored the self-interested nature of man and his ability nevertheless to make moral decisions based on factors other than selfishness. In The Wealth of Nations, Smith laid the early groundwork for economic analysis, but he embedded it in a broader discussion of social justice and the role of government. Today we mainly know only of his analogy of the ‘invisible hand’ and refer to him as defending free markets; whilst ignoring his insight that the pursuit of wealth should not take precedence over social and moral obligations.
We are taught that the free market as a ‘way of life’ appealed to Adam Smith but not that he thought the morality of the market could not be a substitute for the morality for society at large. He neither envisioned nor prescribed a capitalist society, but rather a ‘capitalist economy within society, a society held together by communities of non-capitalist and non-market morality’. As it has been noted, morality for Smith included neighbourly love, an obligation to practice justice, a norm of financial support for the government ‘in proportion to [one’s] revenue’, and a tendency in human nature to derive pleasure from the good fortune and happiness of other people.
He observed that lasting happiness is found in tranquillity as opposed to consumption. In their quest for more consumption, people have forgotten about the three virtues Smith observed that best provide for a tranquil lifestyle and overall social well-being: justice, beneficence (the doing of good; active goodness or kindness; charity) and prudence (provident care in the management of resources; economy; frugality).
I am only very sorry that, no one taught me these when I was a student of economics, and then, I did not tell the truth about Adam Smith to my students when I became an economics lecturer; something that I very much regret and something that am trying hard to rectify, now that I am a “Recovering and Repenting” economist for the common good. At the end of the day, it is our honesty, humility and our struggle to seek the truth that will set us free and allow us to hold our head high.’-Excerpts from a lecture at London School of Economics
Continue to read a few more similar articles from our archive
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The Case for Degrowth: It is urgent, necessary, and greatly needed for our survival
Crisis after Crisis: Ten Steps to Save the World
Photo:pinterest
My Economics and Business Educators’ Oath: My Promise to My Students
- Written by: Kamran Mofid
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Earth Overshoot Day marks the point in the year when humanity uses more resources—timber, fish, crops, fossil fuels,...,than the planet can naturally replenish (or in the case of carbon dioxide, absorb from the atmosphere).
In a perfectly sustainable world, that date would be Dec. 31, or not arrive at all. This year, it’s July 29. Since 1970, when the project started, the day has crept steadily earlier each year—except 2020, when the pandemic cut global consumption and bought an extra month.
‘Earth Overshoot Day marks the date when humanity’s demand for ecological resources and services in a given year exceeds what Earth can regenerate in that year. In 2021, it falls on July 29.
'We know it can be overwhelming to think about the various impacts of global ecological overshoot such as climate change, biodiversity loss, and extreme weather events (to name a few). However, thriving lives within the means of our planet are not out of reach…’- Read more
......
Thriving lives, meaningful living, socioeconomic progress and wealth creation within the means of our planet and what mother nature can offer, are not out of reach. Plenty of solutions exist, if we are guided by wisdom and love for life and Mother Nature
Photo: Petal Republic
Please see below for a selection of common-sense and practical solutions from our GCGI archive:
At a time of profound crises there must be an opportunity for new vision, new understanding and new thinking. There is a desperate need for new practical ways of relating in an increasingly interdependent global community: a time to re-introduce spirituality, ethics, civility, kindness, humanity and the common good into the debate on globalisation, economics, politics, business, education, international relation and much more.
Surely the time is now to rise and challenge the falsehood and the inhumanity of the ideology that since the early 1980s has cheated and humiliated us by monetising all aspects of our lives, and has stopped us from knowing what it means to be human:
We, the people, all around the globe, are slowly realising that our planet, our lives, and more are in desperate need for new measures to evolve humanly, environmentally, economically and politically towards a more cooperative, peaceful and respectful sense of interdependency.
While the urgency is being felt on all levels, too many feel disempowered with the potential to spark a change, make a difference or even perceive an ounce of hope for the future.
The task isn’t small. Indeed, the task is so great that there is only one way to succeed, and that is, all of us, coming together in the spirit of the common good, to empower and enable each one of us to become self-directed, and active in defining this time in the world as opportunity for positive change and healing and for the true formation of a culture of peace by giving thanks, spreading joy, sharing love, seeing miracles, discovering goodness, embracing kindness, practicing patience, teaching tolerance, encouraging laughter, celebrating diversity, showing compassion, turning from hatred, practicing forgiveness, peacefully resolving conflicts, communicating non-violently, choosing happiness and enjoying life. Carpe Diem!
This is the Path to Heal our Broken World
The Sweetness of Being Human
‘We have all of us one human heart.’- William Wordsworth
Neoliberalism, better known as Thatcherism, belongs in the dustbin of history.
Neoliberalism is the Virus. Neoliberalism is the Pandemic.
Photo source and read more: Neoliberalism and Climate Change: How It became the enemy of the Environment?
The time is now to replace the lies of Thatcherism , Milton Friedman and their cronies and let nature be our wisest teacher and the source of inspiration in all we do.
End the madness of the never ending economic growth
Noeliberal education, better known as values-free, for profit education, belongs also in the dustbin of history
Replace the selfishness and hatred of neoliberalism with Kindness
Replace the hopelessness of neoliberalism with Hopefulness
Replace the delusional and destructive neoliberal education with inspirational values-led Education
Replace the devastated neoliberal economy with Economy as if People Mattered
Replace the fake neoliberal ‘teachers’ and let nature to be your wisest Teacher
Throw away materialism and consumerism, ‘Black-Friday’ sales mentality, and opt for simplicity, simple living and be grateful for who you are, what you are and what you have
We are what we eat. Replace junk/fast food with Slow Food for the Common Good to save the World
Enjoy togetherness, family, friends and community. Ours should not be a caravan of despair, but the flame of love and hope
Crisis after Crisis: Ten Steps to Save the World
‘Nature and Me’: Realigning and Reconnecting with Mother Nature’s Wisdom- A Five Part Guide
Live Like a Bird: Philosophical and Wise
......
It’s Now or Never: Do You Want to Know what Normal was before Wishing it Back?
- Written by: Kamran Mofid
- Hits: 715
‘Speaking truth to power is a non-violent political tactic, employed by dissidents against the received wisdom or propaganda of governments they regard as oppressive, authoritarian or an ideocracy. The phrase originated with a pamphlet, Speak Truth to Power: a Quaker Search for an Alternative to Violence, published by the American Friends Service Committee in 1955. Speak Truth To Power is also the title of a global Human Rights initiative under the auspices of Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights…--Read more
‘For eight years, Australia has been taking refugees as hostages. It’s time to ask: who has benefited?’
By Behrouz Boochani, Via The Guardian*
Behrouz Boochani whilst incarcerated on Manus Island Source: AAP
‘Kurdish-Iranian born journalist and refugee Behrouz Boochani spent six years in Australian-run detention
on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea. He now lives in Christchurch, New Zealand.’
Thank you Behrouz, the voice for the voiceless, for your continuing effort and struggles to highlight the inhumanity and the low morale compass of the neoliberal, populist politicians and their cronies. May all the people of goodwill, like yourself, come together and hold these lawless people accountable for their actions.
‘For eight years, Australia has been taking refugees as hostages. It’s time to ask: who has benefited?’
‘The offshore detention policy is a combination of hostage-taking, deception, secrecy,
corruption, populist propaganda and systematic torture.’
‘Eight years have passed since the Australian government mandated offshore detention for all asylum seekers who arrive by boat, which led to the banishing of more than 3,000 refugees to Nauru as well as Manus Island in Papua New Guinea.
Since then, we have heard many tragic stories about the stranded refugees – stories of death, violence, child detention, family separation and countless violations of human rights.
We have heard the stories of the hundreds who have been traumatised and the 14 who were killed. We got to know about Reza Barati who was surrounded by a group of guards and beaten to death. We were told about Hamid Khazaei who developed a leg infection, ended up in a wheelchair and died while in custody. Faysal Ishak Ahmed also died in a Brisbane hospital.
When I think about the stories of these refugees, including myself, the first thought that springs to mind is the abduction of human beings on the sea. We were kidnapped and forcibly transferred to an island we had never heard of. We were robbed of our identity. We turned into a string of numbers through a carefully planned process of dehumanisation. We were led into an evil system which was designed to diminish our identity.
The offshore detention policy was a form of official hostage-taking. For years, the Australian government refused to accept us, while preventing us from being transferred elsewhere. Even when it succumbed to public pressure by signing a resettlement deal with the United States, the government prolongated the transfer process. After all these years, many refugees are still held in indefinite detention.
In addition to being a form of official hostage-taking, the policy provided a platform for the spread of populist ideas and false claims. Kevin Rudd, for example, announced this policy just before the 2013 federal election, while Scott Morrison went to the Christmas Island detention centre alongside a dozen reporters in 2019 and posed heroically against the backdrop of the sea.
They deceived the public into believing that the offshore detention policy was like a building that would collapse if one brick were to be removed from it. They warned against the invasion of boats on Australian shores, but no boats arrived. What boats anyway? They returned every single one to Indonesia.
This is a key point, because whenever the public has put pressure on the government since 2013, officials have highlighted the risks of opening up the borders. This turned out to be an outright lie. What the government has done is create unjustified fear while hiding behind the notion of national security.
The reality is they needed our bodies for retaining their political power. Along the way, they created a $12bn detention industry which has greatly benefited politicians as well as certain security and medical companies. The contracts signed with Paladin is the only instance leaked to the media, but I believe that is just the tip of the iceberg.
The Australian government has made every effort to preserve its detention industry. When thousands of refugees were transferred to the US, the government brought in a group of New Zealanders previously held in Australia. At the end of the day, human bodies are fuel to this money-making torture machine.
The offshore detention policy is a combination of hostage-taking, deception, secrecy, corruption, populist propaganda, and of course, systematic torture. It is sadistic, costly, and unnecessary. After all these years, Australians need to find the courage to look in the mirror and ask themselves, “What have we gained? What have we lost?” These are crucial questions.
It is time to challenge the foundations of this deceitful policy. In the last eight years, human values have been undermined, more than $12bn has been spent and the international reputation of Australia has suffered immensely. The key question to ask right now is: “Who has benefited from this policy?”
Written by Behrouz Boochani, adjunct senior fellow at University of Canterbury
Translated by Mohsen Kafi, a PhD candidate in literary translation studies at Victoria University of Wellington
*This article was originally published in The Guardian on Wednesday 21 July 2021
Lest We Forget
Not all politicians are heartless charlatans and foul-mouthed, mindless buffoons
‘Thank you New Zealand for your humanity welcoming Behrouz who had no friends but the mountains.’
This should serve as a powerful message to Australia and others like them:
"Injustice flourishes in soil where empathy has been uprooted.”
Photo: The Guardian
Behrouz Boochani is welcomed to freedom in New Zealand as he arrives at Auckland airport (14 November 2019).
‘Behrouz Boochani: Refugee who wrote book- ‘No Friends But the Mountains’- using WhatsApp and became the voice of the victims of Australia’s punitive detention system granted a visa to stay in New Zealand and work towards full citizenship after seven-year horrific ordeal, suffering pain, anguish and inhumanity by Australia’s offshore processing regime…’- Continue to read
And this is why every country needs a Jacinda Ardern to discover What it Means to be Human and Great
Jacinda Ardern:
Politics And Economics As If People Mattered To Focus On Empathy, Kindness and Well-Being
Jacinda Ardern campaigns in Christchurch.- Photo: Kai Schwörer/Getty Images Via The Guardian
Prime minister Ardern, has inspired love, kindness, empathy, trust and the common good…-Continue to read
And finally, when it comes to migrants and asylum seekers, there are two more global politicians that I wish to recognise.
They, too, have projected kindness, understanding and compassion towards those in despair and fear.
They are prime minister Justin Trudeau and Chancellor Angela Merkel of Canada and Germany respectively.
Photo: CTV News
Ardern,Trudeau and Merkel, they have become the voices of the voiceless. May God bless them all
- My Poem of the Month: August is the Month of Love, Compassion, Joy, Grace and the Blessed Harvest
- Congratulations Humans, You have finally done it: You have now suffocated the world!
- Do we love the world enough to look after it, to save it?
- Congratulations Humans, You have finally done it: From inside out You are now fully Plasticised!
- Congratulations Humans, You have finally done it: You have set the oceans on fire