Free Lecture: Extreme Oil – May 16

Eric Pineault, Dept. of Economics, Université du Québec à Montréal.

PEF (The Progressive Economics Forum) Steering Committee.

Mandate and Terms of Reference:

The Forum’s general purpose is to promote progressive approaches to economic analysis, policy-making, and activism in Canada.

Membership is invited from progressive economists and others representing a wide range of intellectual and political traditions including but not limited to Keynesian, post-Keynesian, Marxian, structuralist, institutional, feminist, ecologist, and post-modern.

The common elements linking the diverse “heterodox” perspectives represented within the Forum are:

a recognition of the inadequacy of conventional free-market economic theory as a description of how capitalist economies actually work;

a critique of the economic and human consequences of conventional free-market economic policy prescriptions; and

support for thorough-going, progressive democratic structural change in the policies and institutions that currently govern the economy (including macroeconomic policy; labour market institutions and regulations; policies affecting both paid and unpaid work; financial policy and institutions; the ownership and regulation of capital; the regulation of international economic relationships; and environmental protection and regulation), and a desire to participate in the strengthening and promotion of these alternative policies.

The Forum also intends to develop links with like-minded organizations in other countries including associations of left economists (such as the Union for Radical Political Economics URPE or the Conference of Socialist Economists) “Leaders in independent Marxist Theory”.

URPE’s influence in the economics profession is limited to a great degree to the United States. The period of greatest prominence ranged from its inception through the 1970s at a time when graduate and undergraduate students were clamoring for alternative, left, and Marxian teachings in an atmosphere of broader social change in the United States. The organization served as a recruitment center for many universities and colleges that were searching for academics in political economy to fulfill the demands of their students. In the late 1980s and 1990s, however, reduced interest in Marxian economics and radical economics, an increased number of interdisciplinary programs that incorporate radical social theory, an escalation in the number of other political economy organizations and journals, and a rise in the significance of conservative political economy have reduced the importance of URPE in the political economy debate among academics. The shrinking space for radical political economists’ voices in the public debate make the existence of an organization like URPE as important as previously, but more difficult as well. Perhaps the most promising development for radical political economy has been increasing linkages between the schools of thought. Many members of URPE have been active in the commencement of new organizations and journals. For instance, ICARE seeks to build bridges between the various strands of heterodoxy. Some members of URPE became active in the formation of the Association for Social and Economic Analysis (which publishes the journal Rethinking Marxism), and the International Association for Feminist Economics (which publishes Feminist Economics).

Don’t forget your Birkenstocks and your Che beret.