Pilkington, P. (2014) “Is Economics a Science? Dogmatic Economics Vs. Reflective Economics“, Fixing the Economists Blog, 22 Σεπτεμβρίου.
The question asked in the title of this post is actually somewhat of a trick. It is a trick because it all depends upon how you define ‘science’. Often when people say that economics is a science what they are doing is defining ‘science’ in such a way that economics fits the bill. They can do this because there is no real, firm definition of ‘science’ that is widely held among philosophers of science, scientists or, most certainly, among economists (who are the most anti-intellectual of the three groups by far).
If we look at Wikipedia, for example, it gives a definition of science that is Popperian — despite the fact that Popper’s falsifiability criteria have been called into question since the 1960s.
“Science (from Latin scientia, meaning “knowledge”)
is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge
in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe.”
By this criteria economics is probably not a science because it cannot undertake repeatable experiments. Even in a weaker form most marginalist proclamations can be tested and falsified in the sense that they can be shown to not hold given the data we hold yet they remain powerful arguments within the discipline and are taught to students.
Let me then give a different definition of science. I am not saying that this is the correct one but it appears to me to be the one that modern economics as a discipline tried to follow when it was being born in the 19th and 20th century. My definition is as such: science is the search for timeless laws.
Here the obvious reference is Newton and his physics. Now, while we know that Newton’s system was imperfect and was completely overturned in the early 20th century the spirit of what he was doing was, I think, what gave rise to the scientific impulse during the Enlightenment out of which economics was born. When you look at a supply and demand graph you are looking at a representation that is trying to copy Newton by giving us timeless laws. This is also how such constructions are taught to students (any concerns are whisked away using the mysterious ‘ceteris paribus‘ clause).
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- Thoma, M. (2014) “Can New Economic Thinking Solve the Next Crisis?“, The Fiscal Times, 16 Σεπτεμβρίου.
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- Orphanides, A. (2014) “The Euro Area Crisis: Politics Over Economics“, MIT Sloan Research Paper No. 5091-14, 10 Iουνίου.