Anwar Shaikh's Theoretical Point, a Footnote: Part IV

Two things. First, the joke about mainstream economics should be re-read in light of the last blog post. Second, it should be clear with respect to modern economics that I take the modern orthodox neoclassical economists to be the Platonists of economics and the modern heterodox economists (like the Stiglitzes of economics) to be the Aristotelians of economics. The former are Platonists because they start with an idealist model of something which is then used to measure whether the real world matches up with it (does a real market economy like capitalism match up with the Walrasian or general equilibrium model of a perfectly competitive market economy?). The latter are Aristotelians because while they seek to give a more realistic picture of things, they nevertheless do so from the vantage point of an idealist/unrealistic model of something (they show that, for various 'market imperfection' reasons, a real market economy like capitalism can't possibly be anything like a perfectly competitive market economy). Importantly, they both reject starting with an actual picture of what's real, without any notions of perfection and/or imperfections. That is, they disregard the theoretical picture of a real market economy like capitalism which is based on real competition.