The terrible, horrible, not good, very bad truth about economics and what to do about it
The terrible, horrible, not good, very bad truth about economics and what to do about it

Author(s): Lukáš Likavčan
Subject(s): Energy and Environmental Studies, Behaviorism, Methodology and research technology
Published by: Masarykova univerzita nakladatelství
Keywords: actor limits; behavioural economics; design; ecological economics; environmental limits; normative systems; Simon’s Scissors;
Summary/Abstract: This paper presents a sketch of a philosophical defence of heterodoxical methodologies in social sciences from a perspective of behavioural and ecological economics. Its main thesis explores the bad truth about contemporary mainstream economics: that it stays at least partly uninformed about the nature of actors and environment, what is particularly dangerous when it comes to the matter of policy-advising and policy-making. Provided that any social science which postulates norms without the framework of descriptive facts produces in the long run unbearable and counter productive social practice, I propose that economists have to slog through the hard stuff of understanding the material structure of the objects they are interested in, and not simply taking their nature for granted.

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