Page 37 - Azerbaijan State University of Economics

THE JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC SCIENCES: THEORY AND PRACTICE, V.80, # 1, 2023, pp. 35-53

On the other hand, force analysis is concerned with studying the pattern of behaviour
and motivations which are required to keep the system on a path determined by
structural analysis. From these three works of Adolph Lowe, emerges main pillars of
Lowe’s political economics. First is cooperation among social sciences for better
understanding of society and policy making process. Second is orientation of
economic theory towards public policy through instrumental inference and the third is
structural and force analysis.

This essay first brings out the epistemological foundations of Lowe’s political
economics and explores the need for a new method in the era of modern capitalism in
section 2 and section 3. The method of instrumental inference is expounded upon in
section 4 and further application of instrumental inference in the contemporary
national planning is discussed in section 5. In section 6 and 7, the essay critically
analyses Lowe’s method of instrumental inference and argues that Lowe’s Political
Economics provides a feasible and logical framework for thinking about public policy,
planning and their implementation from an open system perspective. Finally, it
summarises and concludes with future research agenda in section 8.

LOWE’S POLITICAL ECONOMICS- EPISTEMOLOGICAL FOUNDATIONS
The practice of modern economics in its bid to project itself as a science, seems to be
forgotten that its domain includes myriads of social constructions which may not be
accurately mathematized. The traditional conception of economics has been founded upon
the unrealistic axiomatizations and abstractions. In this framework, economic action is
based on the individual’s rational choice, devoid of all its social dimensions. Drifting away
from the traditional naturalistic abstractions in economics, Adolph Lowe’s political
economics supports the approach based on the detailed knowledge of how a group of men
behave in larger social setting. Lowe gives a substantive definition of economic action as
restricted to those activities which always claim, in addition to the use of immaterial
resources, the use of some material resources. The advantage of this definition, according
to Lowe is that it carves out a different domain of specific activities by doing away with
the universal “logic of choice” and highlights the historical role which “scarcity of natural
resources” plays in shaping the economic activities (Lowe 1965, p.10). Lowe is of the
view that the generalized notion of scarcity misrepresents the economic activity by placing
it side by side with other human activities.

Defining the economic action in the aforesaid manner, Lowe views the man-matter
relationship as technological core of the economic activity and the man-man
relationship leading to socialization of this technological core processes. The
satisfaction of wants through choices made is conditional upon rules relating various
input combinations to output or we can say engineering rules which themselves are
dependent upon various laws of nature.

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