When does complementarity support pluralism about schools of economic thought?

Journal of Economic Methodology 28 (3):322-335 (2021)
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Abstract

An intuitively appealing argument for pluralism in economics can be made on the grounds that schools of economic thought complement one another. Let us call this the complementarity-based argument for pluralism (CAP). The concepts of complementarity, pluralism, and school of thought are scrutinized in this paper to evaluate this argument. I argue that the complementarity of schools is relative to scientific goals, which implies that discussing complementarity of schools of economic thought requires discussing the goals of economic research. I also distinguish weak from strong complementarity and show that some alleged complementarity relations between schools are weak and thus provide little support for CAP. However, if strong complementarity relations, relative to a valuable goal, can be demonstrated to exist between specific schools, this is a strong reason for pluralism about those schools. Finally, I provide suggestions on how to distinguish strong from weak complementarity.

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Teemu Lari
Universität Hannover

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Is Water H2O? Evidence, Realism and Pluralism.Hasok Chang - 2012 - Boston Studies in the Philosophy and History of Science.
The division of cognitive labor.Philip Kitcher - 1990 - Journal of Philosophy 87 (1):5-22.
Pluralist economics.Edward Fullbrook (ed.) - 2008 - New York: Distributed in the USA exclusively by Palgrave Macmillan.

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