Marx: Colonialism, Class and Capitalism

Artikel aus dem Monatsbericht April 2017.

After completing the module, participants should have knowledge and understanding about the theory of Critical Political Economy and its basic methods. They should be able to apply central concepts to analyse critical questions regarding the embeddedness of economic relations within broader social, political and ecological relations.

In der Volkswirtschaftslehre (VWL) hat sich seit Mitte der 1970er Jahre mit der Neoklassik ein dominierendes theoretisches Paradigma etabliert, welches das ökonomische Denken im Wesentlichen bis heute prägt. Dieser Zustand, der insbesondere seit der Finanz- und Wirtschaftskrise 2008 nicht nur in der akademischen Fachwelt durchaus kontrovers diskutiert wird, hat sowohl weitreichende Auswirkungen auf die innerdisziplinären Machtverhältnisse (z. B. Einseitigkeit in Forschung und Lehre, hierarchische Strukturierung, geringe Beachtung sozial- wissenschaftlicher Forschung und interdisziplinärer Ansätze) als auch auf gesellschafts- und wirtschaftspolitische Entwicklungen (z. B. Ökonomisierung sozialer und politischer Bereiche, einseitige Einflussnahme durch Expertengremien und Think Tanks).

This paper starts with an evaluation of three common arguments against pluralism in economics: (1) the claim that economics is already pluralist, (2) the argument that if there was the need for greater plurality, it would emerge on its own, and (3) the assertion that pluralism means ‘anything goes’ and is thus unscientific. Pluralist responses to all three arguments are summarized. The third argument is identified to relate to a greater challenge for pluralism: an epistemological trade-off between diversity and consensus that suggests moving from a discussion about ‘pros’ and ‘cons’ towards a discussion about the adequate degree of plurality. We instantiate the trade-off by showing how it originates from two main challenges: the need to derive adequate quality criteria for a pluralist economics, and the necessity to propose strategies that ensure the communication across different research programs. The paper concludes with some strategies to meet these challenges.

This is a new online course at bachelor level. It presents an introduction into macroeconomics with a specific focus on the euro area. The theoretical part provides a critical presentation of the two key macroeconomic models: the (neo)classical approach and the Keynesian approach. This allows a comparative analysis of important macroeconomic topics: unemployment inflation government debt and Modern Monetary Theory banks and financial crises. The policy-oriented part discusses the monetary policy of the ECB and the specific challenges for fiscal policy in the euro area. The course also presents other euro area specific topics: Optimum currency area, euro crises, Next Generation EU and Green New Deal.

There was a time when the world still seemed a good – and above all simple – place for monetary authorities. Every few weeks, they had to decide whether, in view of the latest price developments, it would be better to raise the key interest rates by a quarter point …