This issue of the Newsletter comes with two...
This issue of the Newsletter comes with two special features:
First, I am honored to present you the new homepage of the Heterodox Economics Newsletter, which can be accessed here. A transmission to a new site was necessary primary for technical reasons. However, in updating the site we also tried to improve its accessibility as well as its graphical display. We are happy to receive any feedback on the new site - if you have any kind of comment or criticism, we would be happy if you could send us a short email.
Second, I wanted to share with you my slightly longish review on Thomas Piketty’s outstanding and controversial book “Capital in the 21st century”. In previous editorials I had indicated that I think that this book has the potential to facilitate paradigmatic change in economics, while at the same time I critically commented on its mainly neoclassical orientation in terms of economic theory. In my review I further extend my analysis along these lines and try to summarize Piketty’s most important arguments from a heterodox economic perspective. In doing so I find that while Piketty’s book indeed is suitable for challenging much of mainstream economic thought, its potential for doing so must first be fully exacerbated. While I also discuss some important heterodox criticisms of Piketty’s work, my main message for the heterodox economics community is to closely study Piketty’s contribution instead of light-heartedly dismissing it. After all, what Piketty produced is a great pillar of knowledge with many possible connections to heterodox economic thought and concepts; I think the scholarly task is yet to translate and transmit these findings most constructively into the current state of heterodox economic knowledge. I tried to write my review in a way that should facilitate such an engagement with Piketty’s contribution and I sincerely hope it to be taken up in the very same spirit!
Finally, please mind that the Newsletter has now entered “summer mode” and our next issue will be published in four weeks on the 4th of August 2014.
All the best and have a nice summer!
Jakob