Abstract

Dialogue between economists and theologians has recently shifted to questions about economic relationships, virtue, and consumer lifestyles as theologians have become critics of economics as a discipline. Their concerns center on a suspicion of social-scientific methods. Theologians sometimes observe that economic logic and language have become dominant in public and private life, which they attribute to economists’ attempts to work within a value-free reductionist framework. This essay summarizes this critique, focusing on the fact-value dichotomy, self-interest, and the wide application of economic logic. The dominance of economic methods must be understood as a way of pursuing methodological consensus in an arena where many important ethical concerns are hotly contested. Moreover, they are important for understanding a complex social environment. The goal of objectivity, which is at the center of this dialogue, is one that economists can strive for in a limited sense, while still working within an explicitly normative framework.