AN ESSAY ON LAKATOSIAN SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH PROGRAMS AND NEOCLASSICAL ECONOMICS METHODOLOGY: CONTRIBUTIONS AND CRITICS

Abstract

The work of Imre Lakatos intended to present a refinement to popperian falsificationism approach that inspired him, by incorporating concepts developed by Thomas Kuhn, but without denying some of the classical hypothesis of falsificationism, as demarcationist rules and emphasis on investigation and on empirical tests. The author’s main ideas consists in the notion of a research program like a structure endowed with a hardcore of basic hypothesis about raised theories, and protected by a belt of auxiliary hypothesis and by positives and negatives heuristics that guide the scientific investigation process. Lakatos thought was discussed in methodology of economics because it appeared to explain the main work, theoretical and empirical, of this profession. However, despite an initial enthusiasm, the application of lakatosian research programs in economics was criticized as of the eighties. Some of these critics addressed directly to Lakatos; some addressed to falsificationist thought; and some critics attacked the demarcationist rules of scientific methodology. The present paper intends to do a bibliographical revision about the main ideas outstanding in this discussion.