Italian austerity economists claimed pure economics is as rigorous and value-free as hard sciences.

Evidence

Pure economics is imbued with this manner of positivism. (I use the present tense here with a nod to how this continues with presentday neoclassical theory.) Over time, the discipline achieved a reputation for rigor and epistemic legitimacy that equaled that of other hard sciences. In Ricci’s evocative words: “Th e socialist and the protectionist are to the economist like the astrologist to the astronomer, the alchemist to the chemist, the sorcerer to the doctor” (Ricci 1926, 25). — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 1113

Categorization

• XREF: The astrologer/alchemist analogy is a direct ancestor of the modern ‘evidence-based economics’ rhetoric; echoes of the physics-envy critique in Mirowski and Stigler. — connects to: Economics legitimizes austerity claims by pretending to value-free objectivity.; Economic theory reinforced the Italian austerity economists’ classist worldview — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order: How Economists…, 1162
• DEFINE: Positivist pure economics — the claim that economic theory is a value-free core independent of ethics and politics — is defined via its hard-science analogy.

Broader Connections

• Economics legitimizes austerity claims by pretending to value-free objectivity. #expands (0.85)
• Economic theory reinforced the Italian austerity economists’ classist worldview #expands (0.80) — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 1162