“To Be” or “Ought To Be”: The Questions of Empirical Content and Normative Bias in Léon Walras's Methodology

Alexandre Debs

Journal of the History of Economic Thought, 2004, vol. 26, issue 4, 479-492

Abstract: Léon Walras was a truly revolutionary economist. Not only did he leave a lasting mark on economic doctrine participating in the Marginalist Revolution, which supplanted the labor theory of value of the classical school, but he also contributed to major changes in economic methodology as being one of the first and most ardent promoters of the use of mathematics in economics. For an actor who played such a great role in the development of economics, how did he conceive his scientific endeavor? This question can be broken down into two different but related questions: First, how did he know that he had found true scientific laws? What was his theory of knowledge? Is it best described as empiricist (claiming that all knowledge comes from experience) or idealist (claiming that reason can achieve knowledge independently of experience)? And, second, what relation did his writings on pure theory bear with his policy prescriptions? Was there a normative bias in Léon Walras's methodology, i.e., were his positive statements molded by his normative inclinations?This last set of questions has generated much debate, given that Walras actively fought for scientific rigor while not refraining from defending his views on the desired social order. For W. Jaffé, who unearthed his correspondence, a careful study of primary evidence shows that Walras's conception of justice heavily influenced his search for pure truth. The Éléments d'économie politique pure (Éléments), “appears, on the surface, as a competely wert-frei” system, but it is nevertheless “inform[ed]” by “implicit moral convictions” (Jaffé 1977, p. 371). However, D. A. Walker has strongly attacked Jaffe's allegation that Walras's theory of general equilibrium was deliberately constructed as a normative scheme, pointing to Walras's “careful distinctions between normative and positive subject matters” (Walker 1984, p. 466).

Date: 2004
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