In a system of judge-made law, each judge who decides a case in a particular area of law may, in principle, choose to depart from precedent in favor of another rule. This paper examines the question of whether such a system will produce constant oscillation among different legal rules or will...

This paper is prompted by the concluding comments to a recent paper (Denis “Hypostatisation”), which suggests that the neoclassical use of the concept of equilibrium expresses a formal mode of thought. Heterodox tendencies from Marxian to Austrian and Post Keynesian economics, that paper...

In previous research, investigating economists’ conceptions of the relationship between micro-level self-seeking behaviour and the desirability of macro-level outcomes, I identified two rhetorical strategies of laissez-faire, characterised by reductionism, and by holism plus an invisible-hand...

This paper forms part of a research project investigating conceptions of the relationship between micro-level self-seeking agent behaviour and the desirability or otherwise of the resulting macro-level social outcomes in the history of economics. I identify two kinds of conservative rhetorical...