Abstract

This dissertation examines the recent demands for diversifying economics, often advanced under the rubric of pluralism. The dissertation aims at illuminating questions that are foundational to this debate and thereby promoting the resolution of the disagreements. The focus is on the question of whether economics should be open to a wide range of methodological approaches, theoretical frameworks, schools of thought, and so on, in a way that would make the current relatively uniform mainstream approach to economics one among others. The question is considered from the perspective of empirically informed philosophy of science. This approach combines the traditional tools of philosophy, such as critical examination of arguments and concepts, with a multifaceted understanding of science achieved by drawing on sociological, historical and economic research on science. The dissertation consists of four research articles and an introductory essay. Three of these articles examine three corresponding epistemic benefits that increased diversity of approaches and perspectives may be expected to produce. These benefits are the stimulation of inquiry, the reliability of knowledge produced, and the comprehensiveness of attainable knowledge. Each benefit may be used as a premise in arguing that economics should be more diverse than it currently is. Of these three articles, two use Helen Longino’s Critical Contextual Empiricism as the theoretical framework. The fourth article examines the flipside of the benefits, namely, the various costs that securing the benefits may require or that may emerge as side-effects of diversity. This study finds that all the arguments for pluralism examined face challenges. The most pressing challenge is that these arguments often presuppose views about the goals of economics without explicitly arguing for them. While plurality may have certain effects on the knowledge produced by economics, whether these effects are desirable depends on the kinds of epistemic outputs one thinks economics should deliver. However, there is no universal agreement on this. There is no uncontested Common Good against which to measure what changes are improvements. Arguments which do not confront this reality are unlikely to gain wide support. Thus this study highlights the urgency of openly discussing the research agenda and overall aims of the discipline, and helps articulate the views involved in such a discussion by developing suitable conceptual tools. Nevertheless, the most substantial challenges are only faced by views according to which fundamental reform in economics is needed; economics would plausibly benefit from a moderate shift towards openness to non-mainstream approaches and perspectives. At the end, the desirability of a shift towards more intellectual diversity in economics is a matter of costs and benefits. The more modest variations of pluralism one considers, the more likely it is that the benefits outweigh the costs.