LAMENT FOR ECONOMICS, OR HOW BARBARA WOOTTON GAVE IT ALL AWAY AND BECAME A SOCIOLOGIST

Abstract

In 1938 Barbara Wootton published Lament For Economics, an indictment of the state of contemporary economic theory. She complained that economics was of no use to anyone, and unintelligible to all except a small minority of specialists. Economists were unable to agree; they ignored reality, and often served as apologists for capitalism. Thus, economics was not a science, and could contribute little or nothing either to the understanding of capitalism or to the organisation of a future socialist society. Wootton’s criticism made no impact at the time, and she soon abandoned economics and became an eminent criminologist and social theorist. However, many of her arguments were repeated, 62 years later, in the French students’ manifesto that led to the formation of the Post Austistic Economics movement.

Citation

King, J.E. (2004), "LAMENT FOR ECONOMICS, OR HOW BARBARA WOOTTON GAVE IT ALL AWAY AND BECAME A SOCIOLOGIST", Samuels, W.J. (Ed.) Wisconsin "Government and Business" and the History of Heterodox Economic Thought (Research in the History of Economic Thought and Methodology, Vol. 22), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 301-321. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0743-4154(03)22056-3