1 MAKING HISTORY BY MAKING IDENTITY AND INSTITUTIONS: THE EMERGENCE OF POST KEYNESIAN-HETERODOX ECONOMICS IN BRITIAN, 1974 - 1996 By Dr. Frederic S. Lee EAEPE 2007 Conference November 1 – 3, 2007 Universidade Porto Porto, Portugal Department of Economics 211 Haag Hall University of Missouri-Kansas City 5100 Rockhill Road Kansas City, Missouri 64110 USA E-mail: [email protected] 2 MAKING HISTORY BY MAKING IDENTITY AND INSTITUTIONS: THE EMERGENCE OF POST KEYNESIAN-HETERODOX ECONOMICS IN BRITIAN, 1974 - 1996 ABSTRACT The complexity of the history of heterodox economics combined with the lack of extensive detailed studies on components of the history means that it is not yet possible to produce a general history of heterodox economics or a generalized historical identity of heterodox economists. Some detailed studies have been produced on specific heterodox theories and on the organizational and institutional components of the history and thereby have contributed to creating a historical identity for heterodox economists, This paper is a further contribution to this agenda in that it reconstructs the historical emergence of Post Keynesian-heterodox economics in terms of identity, institutions, and organizations in Britain from 1974 to 1996. In 1970 the Conference of Socialist Economists (CSE) was formed with the purpose of developing a Marxian-heterodox economics. Although initially successful, by 1975 it was split by disagreement over the validity of Marxian economic theory, with a number of economists leaving the CSE. But outside the CSE circa 1974 was an intellectual wilderness—and this is where the story starts. Thus the first section deals with the non-Cambridge and Cambridge efforts to create a Post Keynesian-heterodox identity and institutional and organizational support for that identity from 1974 to 1988; while the second section deals with the fruits of these efforts, that is the creation and activity of Post-Keynesian Economics Study Group, of the Malvern conferences, and of the development of various publishing outlets from 1988 to 1996. The final section concludes the paper with a discussion of the organization and identity of the community of Post Keynesian-heterodox economists. 3 MAKING HISTORY BY MAKING IDENTITY AND INSTITUTIONS: THE EMERGENCE OF POST KEYNESIAN-HETERODOX ECONOMICS IN BRITIAN, 1974 - 19961 Frederic S. Lee* 1 Introduction The complexity of the history of heterodox economics combined with the lack of extensive detailed studies on components of the history means that it is not yet possible to produce a general history of heterodox economics or a generalized historical identity of heterodox economists. Some detailed studies have been produced on specific heterodox theories and on the organizational and institutional components of the history and thereby have contributed to creating a historical identity for heterodox economists, This article is a further contribution to this agenda in that it reconstructs the historical emergence of Post Keynesian-heterodox economics in terms of identity, institutions, and organizations in Britain from 1974 to 1996. In 1970 the Conference of Socialist Economists (CSE) was formed with the purpose of developing a Marxian-heterodox economics. Although initially successful, by 1975 it was split by disagreement over the validity of Marxian economic theory, with a number of economists leaving the CSE. But outside the CSE circa 1974 was an intellectual wilderness—and this is where the story starts. Thus the first section deals with the non-Cambridge and Cambridge efforts to create a Post Keynesian-heterodox identity and institutional and organizational support for that identity from 1974 to 1988. The second section deals with the fruits of these efforts, that is the creation and activity of Post-Keynesian Economics Study Group, of the Malvern conferences, and of the development of various publishing outlets from 1988 to 1996, when the community of Post Keynesian-heterodox economists was well-established— 4 hence where the story ends. The final section concludes the article with a discussion of the organization and identity of the community of Post Keynesian-heterodox economists. 2. Creating Post Keynesian-Heterodox Identity, 1974 - 1988 Outside of the CSE in the early 1970s there were no national academic organizations that heterodox economists could identify with and be drawn to; there were no academic economic journals to which to submit papers; and there were no annual economic conferences or nationally-oriented seminars to attend. In short, there were, outside CSE and with the exception of Cambridge, almost no local and no regional and national organizations in place in the early 1970s that could contribute to the creation of a Post Keynesian-heterodox identity. Thus, to purse the type of economics they found interesting, heterodox economists outside of CSE found it necessary to build the institutions and organizations step-by-step and in this process the foundations for a Post Keynesian-heterodox identity was laid. And this difficult task was made much harder because, except for a significant concentration at Cambridge and a smaller concentration at Manchester, Post Keynesian-heterodox economists were sparsely spread throughout the old university sector while the majority of them were located in the poorer, less reputable polytechnic sector. 2.1 Building Institutions and Organization Outside of Cambridge In the 1970s, economists not engaged with the CSE also became skeptical of neoclassical economics and were, in hindsight, groping their way towards a Post Keynesian-heterodox approach.2 Because their skepticism often prevented them from obtaining employment in the university sector, many of them became employed in the polytechnic sector. Thus it is not surprising that the first attractor of skeptical qua heterodox economists outside of 5 Cambridge was the polytechnic-based Thames Papers in Political Economy. It was a series of occasional papers appearing three times a year co- produced at Thames Polytechnic (now University of Greenwich) and at North East London Polytechnic (now University of East London), which was started in 1974 by Thanos Skouras.3 The purpose of the Thames Papers was to stimulate public discussion of practical issues in political economy and to bring to the notice of a wider audience of economists controversial questions in economic theory.4 This meant that papers presenting non-neoclassical approaches to both theoretical and policy questions of political economy dominated its publications since they had no easy access to publication otherwise.5 The early publications reflected the broadly heterodox perspectives of Skouras and the early members of the editorial board, such as George Hadjimatheou and Yannis Kitromilides, as not any one particular theoretical viewpoint was championed--see for example Robinson (1974), Harcourt (1975), Nore (1976) and Green (1977). In 1978 there was a major change in the composition of the editorial board with Philip Arestis, Sami Daniel, and Klaus Heidensohn becoming members.6 This change coincided with a perceptible shift towards publishing Post Keynesian-oriented papers, beginning with Chick's 1978 paper, "Keynesians, Monetarists and Keynes: the end of the debate--or a beginning?" (1978a). In particular, Arestis became increasingly attracted to Post Keynesian economics as well active on the editorial board. When Skouras returned to Greece in 1983 to advise the Deputy Minister of National Economy, Arestis became co-editor (and eventually editor) and took charge of the editorial duties. By this time he was in contact with Alfred Eichner and had become a Post Keynesian economist with missionary zeal.7 Consequently, the shift to Post Keynesian papers became noticeable. 6 In 1982 the first paper with 'Post-Keynesian' in the title was published (see Harcourt, 1982) and that was quickly followed by four similar titles over the next four years--see Eichner (1983), Moore (1984), Arestis and Driver (1984), and Davidson (1986).8 In addition, nearly all the papers after 1986 until 1990 when Thames Papers ceased publication were written by Post Keynesian economists.9 Thus for the 1980s Thames Papers was an important ‘local’ publishing outlet for British Post Keynesians but more importantly it provided an institutional anchor for the development of Post Keynesian economics. [Daniel, 1999; Driver, 1999; and Skouras, 1999] A second development in this area was the establishment of the British Review of Economic Issues in 1977 by the Association of Polytechnic Teachers in Economics, which itself was established in 1972. The aims of the Association were to promote the development of economics teaching and to encourage research into economics in polytechnics and other institutions of higher education and the Review was started with this in mind. Skouras (1977 – 1984) was the first editor and almost immediately he was publishing papers of interest to Post Keynesian-heterodox economists--see Chick (1978b) and Arestis and Riley (1980). In 1983 the first paper with 'Post-Keynesian' in the title was published (Dabysing and Jones, 1983). In 1985 Arestis (1985 - 1988) became editor and the number of papers by and/or of interest to Post Keynesian-heterodox economists. Thus in a very short time, the Review became identified as a journal that would publish heterodox articles, with the result that by 1988 virtually every issue of the Review carried a heterodox-oriented article.10 In addition to journal publications, there were other activities