Thanks for your reply. My point is simply that an organized group of thinkers can make substantial changes in the discipline of economics. I believe that before the seventies most people thought Milton Friedman was a nut or a scholar of dubious merit (I still think this). I could be wrong but I think Hayek's appointment at U of Chicago was not even in the economics department. Nevertheless, these two outsiders and their allies were able to cause a major paradigm shift in economics.
You seem to foreclose the possibility that a group of leftist thinkers could do the same. What is the basis for believing this? Where are the boundaries of the "ruling class opinion." I am currently reading Simon Schama's book, _Citizens_, on the origins of the French Revolution. His thesis (as far as I have read) seems to be that the idea of revolution came from the French ruling class itself. Do you think it is possible that the fashion for 'radical chic' amongst the ruling class could lead them to espouse a theory that is completely hostile to their interests? Just wonderin' ....
Vikash Yadav Philadelphia, PA
-- Doug Henwood wrote: You're mixing meanings of the word conservative here. The Keynes->Friedman shift was dramatic, and in that sense not "conservative," but it reflected the rightward shift in ruling class opinion. To adopt the language of psychoanalysis, it was capital-syntonic.
Doug