On Sat, 10 Jun 1995, Doug Henwood wrote:
> Part of what the deficit discussion is a sorting out of "progressive
> economists'" relation to Keynes. With Marx very un-chic, many progressives
> - or, as Alex Cockburn says, pwogwessives - have embraced JMK as an
> acceptable alternative. Which Keynes - the conservative or the radical, the
> Bastard or the Legitimate Original the Post(-)Keynesians claim to have
> rescued - isn't clear. Is this a promising thing, or a sign of weakness and
> desperation? Are progressive economists, or pwogwessive economists (uh-oh,
> am I guilty of speechism?), doing anyone a favor by trying to hide, retreat
> from, or sugar coat their radical roots? Is radical uncertainty something
> one can build an intellectual and political movement on?
>
> Doug
>
While I don't believe that Keynes will be of much help in building a
political movement that is likely to deal with the important issues, Paul
Davidson's distinction between ontological and epistimological
uncertainty is an important distinction.
Epistomological uncertainty means that we don't know what is
going to happen. This might as has been charged lead to some policy
nihilism. But humans tend to push on as if they did know what will be coming.
Ontological uncertainty means that we get to make the future.
Surely this is an important part of a left intellectual and political
tradition. The question then is what sort of institutions and society do
we wish to construct.
Rod Hay
Department of Economics
McMaster University
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
