Economics in Europe and The United States: the controversy

Abstract

Abstract: The Methodenstreit was a reaction against the growing formalization of economics, the use of the hypothetical-deductive method to guide the production of knowledge (Pure Economics). The more reactive posture maintained that the scientific method was the historical one, the study of all facets of the economic phenomena, including the local and temporal specificities (Concrete Economics). The current "European Controversy�, if I may put it this way, has a mark given by a special number of the journal KYKLOS (1995). Fifteen authors discussed there the differences between the EU and the USA and are here reviewed. Our hypothesis was that the European side is compatible with the vision that centers the science in Social Economics; this sphere of knowledge intertwines the social and human sciences to take into account all universal and necessary elements of the economic phenomena; the evolution is perceived in the interaction of the three spheres of knowledge, among themselves and with the art of economics. I particularly focus the Ricardian vice, the monism, and the evaluation of the scientific work.