Economics : anti-text

The current crisis in economics, which is expressing itself in the revival of Marxist political economy and the flourishing of 'radical economics, has had clear and far-reaching effects on the teaching of the subject in higher education. Students come to the subject expecting to gain an understanding of how economic society functions, but they see that many of the funda mental questions about economic society are either dismissed out of hand, or cannot be handled by the conventional theory of the so-called 'neoclassical/neo-Keynesian' synthesis. Little of the turmoil among economists spills over into the student's formal experience: either the conventional theory is regurgitated, or the 'radical' theory is consigned to its special course with

little opportunity for dialogue. This book is a bold attempt to change all of that. It is offered as an aid to understanding the current criticisms of the orthodoxy, and is designed to be read both as a textbook in its own right and as a subversive companion to the dominant textbooks on the mainstream courses. As such, its aim is to serve the frustrations of students seeking a radical alternative, and to provide a framework for courses which increasingly need to encounter the arguments of the radical theorists.