In 1997, I submitted my paper (published on this site) on an endogenous profit rate cycle, to the annual conference of the Royal Economic Society. It was rejected without reasons being given. My experience paralleled that of many other scholars from heterodox economic backgrounds, and initiated the internal crisis in economics that gave rise to the Association for Heterodox Economics, the World Economics Association, and the many organisations grouped around the International Confederation of Associations for Pluralism in Economics. This internal revolt, ten years later, was to lead to the explosion of student discontent that took place after the financial crash of 2008. In this post, I reproduce my original letter of submission, and the letter I then wrote, having been informed of my paper’s rejection. Of course, I never received a reply.
My experience was, as noted above, no different from that of many dozens, probably more, of heterodox submissions which the reigning orthodoxy took upon itself to judge inadequate without bothering itself to provide so much as a figleaf of justification. The same experience took place in country after country, the most remarkable aspect of which is that the greater the opposition, both inside and outside the profession, and the greater the empirical failures, the more entrenched was the resistance. In this way, economics revealed itself to be a religion; a godless religion, in which market perfection displaced the last vestiges of humanity from the very notion of divinity.
Professor David Greenaway
Department of Economics
University of Nottingham
University Park
Nottingham NG7 2RD
30th October 1996
Dear Professor Greenaway,
I am enclosing three copies of my paper An Endogenous Profit Rate Cycle to be considered for inclusion in the programme for the 1997 conference of the Royal Economic Society. I wasn’t clear from the instructions for submission whether you required double-spaced or single-spaced and therefore erred on the side of economy.
I understand from Dr Bill Gerrard that there was a misprint in the RES newsletter and that the closing date for submissions was in fact 31st October. I hope therefore that this paper will be eligible for consideration.
Yours faithfully
Alan Freeman
| Professor David Greenaway Department of Economics University of Nottingham University Park Nottingham NG7 2RD |
25th January 1997
Dear Professor Greenaway,
I write concerning your letter of last month informing me that my paper An Endogenous Profit Rate Cycle would not be considered for inclusion in the programme for the 1997 conference of the Royal Economic Society.
Having organised conferences I appreciate it is difficult to enter into correspondence about individual papers. However, having considered the matter for a while I find I require further information if you are able to provide it.
In particular since I have to consider whether and how to pursue the issues raised in the paper, I need to know whether it was passed over because its content was considered of insufficient intrinsic interest to be dealt with at an RES conference, because it contained identifiable flaws, or because its quality was not considered high enough.
The paper has provoked considerable interest among those with whom I have discussed it privately and I was quite surprised it was not included in the programme. In the year following Richard Goodwin’s death I thought it appropriate for the RES to discuss work in his tradition. The paper is short and to the point; it exhibits a nonlinear system manifesting regular asymmetric cycles which though simple has not to my knowledge appeared anywhere else in the literature; it reproduces and supports Goodwin’s well-known argument that the persistence of business cycles requires nonlinear equation systems, but demonstrates that such cycles may result purely from variations in the profit rate independent of the distribution of net output, in distinction from the systems to which Goodwin devoted most of his attention. It focusses, therefore, on a central issue in the early and ongoing debate on the causes of cyclic behaviour – namely whether wage-pressure is responsible for downturns – the simplicity of the model being consciously employed to concentrate attention on this issue. It is moreover, it seems to me, of some consequence in the modern debate between exogenous shock and endogenous theories of the business cycle.
These are all matters I think worth pursuung. The question I must put is whether it is worth pursuing through the Royal Society. In particular I would like, all other circumstances being equal, to submit it to the conference next year since I think its conclusions are of interest to British economists. If, however, it was not included because the subject matter was considered unworthy, then there is clearly no point in doing so.
I would be grateful for any light you could shed on this.
Yours sincerely
Alan Freeman
[I received no reply]