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- Title
Some Legacies of Robbins' An Essay on the Nature and Significance of Economic Science.
- Authors
LIPSEY, RICHARD G.
- Abstract
This paper criticizes three Robbinsian positions still often found in modern economics: (1) the methodology of intuitively obvious assumptions; (2) treating facts as illustrations rather than as tests of theoretical propositions; (3) assuming that theory provides universally applicable generalizations independent of the characteristics of individual economies and so are independent of specific historical processes. Two corollaries of point (3) are that theory cannot assist in explaining unique historical events such as the emergence of sustained growth in the West and that economists need not interest themselves in the details of the technologies that produce the nation's wealth.
- Subjects
CRITICISM; ESSAY on the Nature &; Significance of Economic Science, An (Book); ROBBINS, Lionel Robbins, Baron, 1898-1984; TECHNOLOGICAL innovations &; economics; MICROECONOMICS
- Publication
Economica, 2009, Vol 76, p845
- ISSN
0013-0427
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1111/j.1468-0335.2009.00792.x