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Caldwell’s Beyond Positivism was a key publication that helped precipitate the consolidation of the methodology of economics into a distinct subfield within economics. Reconsidering it after 35 years, it is striking for its antinaturalism (i.e., its lack of deference to the actual practices of economics) or, perhaps, for its meta-naturalism (displayed in its excessive deference to the philosophy of science) and for its defense of pluralism. It offers pluralism as an unsuccessful defense against dogmatism. Against Caldwell’s pluralism, dogmatism is better opposed by a commitment of fallibilism and scientific humility. Caldwell’s defense of Austrian methodology is taken as a case study to illustrate and investigate his key themes and the issues that they raise.

Evaluates the significance of Clarence Edwin Ayres′ contribution to the historical development of the institutionalist school of economic thought. Summarizes Ayres′ philosophy of pragmatic instrumentalism and integrates it into his theory of economic progress, which is disaggregated into its component parts: his theory of normative value; his theory of economic causation; and his theory of economic policy. Thoroughly explicates and carefully evaluates each of these theories. Concludes that Clarence Ayres has made an important contribution to the history of institutionalism by synthesizing the pragmatic philosophy of C.S. Peirce, William James, and John Dewey with the institutional economics of Thorstein B. Veblen, John R. Commons, and Wesley C. Mitchell.

Bloomington scholars are critical of the rather wide-spread “Model Platonism” of both Austrian and Chicago economists. Their empirical, B, perspective avoids the more extreme views of both Austrian “mindful economics,” A, and Chicago “mindless economics,” C. Yet the B is not a mere convex combination of A and C. It is rather a psychologically grounded empirical evidence-oriented approach that keeps clear of the non-empirical spirit of von Mises’ and Selten’s methodological dualism on one hand and the instrumentalist and behaviorist spirit of much of neo-classical economics on the other hand.

I am indebted to Anthony Waterman for identifying the largely illegible phrase cuius regio, eius religio, found near the end of Ostrander’s notes. Waterman writes, in explanation, apropos of Martin Luther: Lit. ‘whatever of the king, so of the religion’: it means that L. thought (being the Erastian he was), that the religion of a country should be that of its sovereign prince. Note: (a), the assumption, almost universal at that time, that there can be only ONE church in any Christian nation; and (b) the assumption, standard until the Scottish Enlightenment I should think (though people like Locke begin to chip away at it) that – as Louis XIV put it with admirable economy, ‘l’etat c’est moi’ (Waterman to Samuels, December 12, 2002).

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to research on the impact that the creation of value theory has on professional, organizational, and economic performance. However, a special emphasis is on explicating the theoretical foundation of the concept.

This paper is based on a hermeneutic study of the relationship between value creation and managing economic resources. The paper traces the value creation concept to its roots from the foundation of Western Civilization through the value theory of Adam Smith and up to recent technological age advancements in value theory.

Since its emergence the value concept has been explicated in an abundance of literature. However, there has been very little in regards to explanations detailing the theoretical underpinnings of the concept. According to John Stuart Mill, attempts to apply value theory will fail (due to misinformation or inaccurate information) without inclusiveness of the full scope of what is relevant for social science and social economic research.

Although studies on organizational behavior encompass the economic aspects of research economic research tends to be narrower in scope making it difficult to verify some value claims in economic terms. This is especially true in terms of making claims in regards to the connection between economic value theory, social value theory, the Philosophy of Economics, and the Philosophy of Science.

The study introduces a theoretical framework for integrating the value added and value creation concepts as a strategy for increasing shareholder benefits, stakeholder capital, and social capital.

The paper explains how the value creation concept contributes to an increase in wealth, prosperity, flourishing by drawing from a technological age approach to value creation.

The paper fills the void in the literature regarding the theoretical framework of the concept thus undergirds claims about its practical benefits by clarifying its theoretical framework.

Recent efforts to go beyond gross domestic product as a measure of economic performance raise important questions about the nature of the economy, including: what is the best measure of a sound, flourishing economy, and what is the purpose of ‘doing well’ in economic terms? One possible measure of the soundness of an economy is the extent to which it results in better lives for humans – a thought that has inspired measures such as the Human Development Index, among others. In the bigger picture, a sound, flourishing economy should also be consistent with good, and perhaps optimal, lives for non-humans, and well-functioning ecosystems. On this measure, economics should not be an altogether anthropocentric enterprise. To go beyond anthropocentric notions of economic performance, a degree of integration between economics, philosophy and biology is required, with Umwelt theory and biosemiotics indicating a way forward. A merely economic outlook can easily lead to the commodification of each and every organism and natural resource, thus neglecting the agency, interests and intrinsic value of animals and other non-humans. To truly ‘serve all’ in an Anthropocene-era world, where the living conditions of practically all organisms on the planet are affected by human economic activities, economists need to acknowledge that there are economic stakeholders beyond humans. This would make economics more compatible with current outlooks in normative ethics with regard to the value of animals, biodiversity, etc., and could be part of a radical reconceptualization of the nature of the economy, in which economic value is situated within value theory in a wider sense.

In 1982 my book Beyond Positivism: Economic Methodology in the Twentieth Century was published. At the 2017 History of Economics Society meeting, a session was held to mark the 35th anniversary of that event. Papers by Wade Hands, Kevin Hoover, Tony Lawson, and the trio Peter Boettke, Solomon Stein, and Virgil Storr were prepared. In this paper, I respond by reflecting on how I came to write Beyond Positivism and on the state of the field of economic methodology at the time, and then commenting briefly on each of the papers noted above.

When Beyond Positivism was published 35 years ago, it presented a compelling case for methodological change in the economics profession. That case remains equally compelling in the present day as, tragically, economics remains largely without the methodological pluralism at the heart of Beyond Positivism’s message. Among the costs of an environment of methodological myopia are widespread misinterpretations and the diversion of scholars from efforts at economic understanding to methodological wrangling, which we illustrate using the experience of Austrian economics in the 20th century. Beyond Positivism, we suggest, continues to provide the intellectual case for a pluralist discipline of economics, but one that requires complementary institutional reforms to come to fruition.

Menger′s Grundsätze is explored; the Aristotelian background of the discourse is probed, as is the problematic image of Menger sketched in the secondary literature as soon as it is confronted with this Aristotelanism and with the subjective value theory and the motif of time, error and uncertainty. The conflicting elements of this picture are pieced together.