Economic science is characterized by a reduction to the market fundamentalist paradigm. Plural economy. Alternatives in Economics by Rudolf Hickel [This article published on September 24, 2019 is translated from the German on the Internet, BdWi - Forum Wissenschaft 3/2019
Although the economy is a determining part of society and individual conditions are shaped by it, there is no opening for the related questions. The bleak model figure "homo oeconomicus" dominates. In the history of the theoretical debate, important impulses can be found for economic science. But the predominant teaching, research and, above all, consulting are characterized by a deep contradiction: Markets are in a position to achieve the optimal balance of the economy as a whole through endogenous self-regulation. The prerequisite for this is that prices are formed by supply and demand. If, on the other hand, there are real crises, then the causes are ascribed to the so-called "institutions outside the market" - state and trade unions. Competing paradigms or different perspectives of theory formation are not taken up by mainstream economics. Alternative schools of thought such as Marxism or Keynesianism are given the stamp of scientific ineptitude and are excluded. Instead, it is suggested that there is a uniform and self-evident way of thinking and that only one relevant economic method has emerged. Critical approaches oppose this prevailing, neoclassically founded orthodoxy. The colorful world of different alternative views is summarized under the keyword "heterodox economics". Students also protested against the prevailing one-sidedness. Thus in 2003 the working group "Postal Autistic Economy" was founded, which was renamed "Network Plural Economics" in 2012. The Plural Economy movement demands more theoretical diversity and interdisciplinarity. In addition, it criticises the seemingly religious belief in the market, which suppresses questions of unjust distribution, poverty, monopolistically bequeathed markets, new dependencies on the labour market and the division of the world economy. The theoretically completely underexposed eco-crisis and the presented market fundamentalist sham therapies intensify the necessity of a growth-critical economy. A critical stocktaking of the deficits of the predominant economic science teaching and research is the focus of this issue, which the BdWi publishes together with the working group Alternative Economics. The book also presents independent theoretical approaches