A miséria do instrumentalismo na tradição neoclássica

• Autor(a) principal: Duayer, Mário
• Data de Publicação: 2001
• Outros Autores: Medeiros, João Leonardo, Painceira, Juan Pablo
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Estudos Econômicos (São Paulo)
• Texto Completo: https://www.revistas.usp.br/ee/article/view/215502
• topic: Tradição neoclássica; Instrumentalismo; Relativismo; Ontologia; Neoclassical tradition; Instrumentalism; Relativism; Ontology

This paper discusses some echoes of anti-realist and relativist attitudes in economic science. In particular, it is a critique ofthe presently fashionable idea that instrumentalism suffices as philosophical support to economias. Such a stance is put forward by Lisboa (FGV/RJ) in a strikingly outspoken defense ofthe neoclassical tradition. Taking for granted that the demise ofpositivism should be exclusive!/ credited to the works ofKuhn and Lakatos, Lisboa seems to believe that the relativism (ontological) underlying their conceptions constitutes an undisputable foundation of ali seientifie endeavor; hence his efforts to demonstrate that the scientific practice ofneoclassical tradition had been throughout consistem with that foundation. Yet as ontological relativism means that the social reality is out-and-out discursive, it follows that any scientific discourse "constructs" the ends ofwhich it is an instrument. On this basis, the article tries to argue that the instrumentalist legitimation ofthe neoclassical tradition attempted by Lisboa is flawed.