Lo microfundado: Un contraste entre las teorías de Robert Lucas y Jens Beckert
Palabras clave:
análisis microfundado, Robert Lucas, Jens Beckert, expectativas ficcionales, sociología económica, modelo de acción racionalResumen
En 1976, el economista Robert E. Lucas argumenta que la síntesis neoclásica-keynesiana incurre en un error al no considerar que las reacciones de los agentes se modifican ante cambios en la política económica; por ello, propone poner el foco en los “parámetros profundos” que implican las preferencias individuales. La crítica de Lucas ha sido la base de los modelos macroeconómicos dominantes, microfundados a partir de agentes maximizadores que parten de expectativas racionales. Ahora bien, dadas las limitaciones que ha demostrado este enfoque, en especial a la hora de abordar de manera satisfactoria las motivaciones que suscitan la acción, resulta pertinente incorporar y contraponer el análisis de Jens Beckert, en tanto representa un cambio de perspectiva radical frente al abordaje dominante. Si, de acuerdo al autor, lo que motiva la acción económica es la intención “razonable” de obtener el mejor resultado, materializada a través de decisiones tomadas en base a “expectativas ficticias”, la posibilidad del cálculo -fundante en el modelo neoclásico- desaparece. En un contexto de incertezas, no hay cálculo racional posible. Esto permite resignificar el abordaje micro fundado, alejado del resultado determinista al que lo ha reducido el individualismo metodológico.Citas
Akerlof, G. A. (1970). “The market for "lemons": Quality uncertainty and the market mechanism”. The quarterly journal of economics, pp. 488-500.
Alchian, A. (1950). “Uncertainty, evolution, and economic theory”, Journal of political economy, Vol. 58, Nº 3, pp. 211-221.
Arrow, K. J. (2001). “Uncertainty and the Welfare Economics of Medical Care (American Economic Review, 1963)”. Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law, Vol. 26, N°5, pp. 851-883.
Becker, G. (1992). “The economic way of looking at life”. Coase-Sandor Institute for Law & Economics. Working Paper, Nº12. http://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1509&context=law_and_economics
Beckert, J. (1996). “What is Sociological about Economic Sociology? Uncertainty and the Embeddedness of Economic Action”, Theory and Society, Vol. 25, Nº 6, pp. 803-840.
Beckert, J. (2002). Beyond the market: The social foundations of economic efficiency. New Jersey, Princeton University Press.
Beckert, J. (2003). “Economic Sociology and Embeddedness: How Shall We Conceptualize Economic Action?”, Journal of Economic Issues, Vol. 37, Nº 3, pp. 769-787.
Beckert, J. (2009). “The social order of markets”. Theory and Society, Vol. 38, Nº 3, pp. 245-269.
Beckert, J. (2013a). “Capitalism as a System of Expectations: Toward a Sociological Microfoundation of Political Economy”, Politics & Society, Vol. 41, Nº 3, pp. 323-350.
Beckert, J. (2013b). “Imagined futures: fictional expectations in the economy”, Theory and Society, Vol. 42, Nº 3, pp. 219-240.
Blanchard, O. (2016). Do DSGE Models Have a Future?, documento electrónico: https://piie.com/system/files/documents/pb16-11.pdf, acceso 5 de junio.
Blinder, A. S. (1987). “The rules-versus-discretion debate in the light of recent experience”. Review of World Economics, Vol. 123, N° 3, pp. 399-414.
Bourdieu, P. (2002). Las estructuras sociales de la economía. Buenos Aires, Manantial
Chick, V. (2016) “On Microfoundations and Keynes´Economics”, Review of Political Economy, Vol. 28, Nº 1, pp 99-112.
Chiodi, G., & Ditta, L. (Eds.). (2007). Sraffa or an alternative economics, New York, Springer.
Colander, D., Howitt, P., Kirman, A., Leijonhufvud, A., & Mehrling, P. (2008). “Beyond DSGE models: toward an empirically based macroeconomics”, The American Economic Review, Vol. 98, Nº 2, pp. 236-240.
Collins, R. (1981). “On the microfoundations of macrosociology”. American journal of sociology, Vol. 86, Nº 5, pp. 984-1014.
Davidson, P. (1991). “Is probability theory relevant for uncertainty? A post Keynesian perspective”, The Journal of Economic Perspectives, Vol 5, Nº 1, pp. 129-143.
Del Negro, M., & Schorfheide, F. (2006). “How good is what you've got? DGSE-VAR as a toolkit for evaluating DSGE models”, Economic Review-Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, Vol. 91, Nº 2, pp. 21.
Dequech, David (2006). “The New Institutional Economics and the Behaviour under Uncertainty”, Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, Vol. 59, Nº 1, pp. 109-31.
Dotsey, M., & King, R. G. (1987). “Business cycles”, The new Palgrave: A dictionary of economics, Nº1, pp. 302-10.
ECB. n.d. a. “Economic Research.” European Central Bank. Documento electrónico: http://www.ecb.int/home/html/researcher.en.html, acceso 25 de agosto.
Friedman, M. ([1953] 1966). “The methodology of positive economics”. Essays in Positive Economics, Chicago, Univ. of Chicago Press, pp. 180-213.
Friedman, M. (1962). Price theory, a provisional text (No. HB221 F75).
Galbraith, J.K. (1958). The affluent society, Nueva York, New American Library.
Garfinkel, Harold. (1967). Studies in Ethnomethodology. Englewood Cliffs, N.J., Prentice-Hall.
Gordon, R. J. (2011). “The history of the Phillips curve: Consensus and bifurcation”. Economica, 78(309), 10-50.
Granovetter, M. ([1985] 2003). “Acción económica y estructura social: el problema de la incrustación.” En Requena Santos, F. (comp.): Análisis de redes sociales: orígenes, teorías y aplicaciones. Madrid, Alianza. pp. 231-269.
Hahn F. (1989). The Economics of Missing Markets, Information and Games. Oxford, Oxford University Press.
Harcourt, G.C (1977). The Microeconomic Foundations of Macroeconomics: Proceedings of a Conference. London, Macmillan.
Heredia, M. & Roig, A. (2008). “¿Franceses contra anglosajones? La problemática recepción de la sociología económica en Francia.” Apuntes de Investigación del CECYP, Nº 14, pp. 211-228.
Hicks, J.R. (1937). “Mr. Keynes and the classics: a suggested interpretation”. Econometrica: Journal of the Econometric Society, Vol. 5, Nº 2, pp. 147-159.
Hicks, J.R. (1939). Value and Capital: An Inquiry into Some Fundamental Principles of Economic Theory. Oxford, Clarendon Press.
Holmes, Douglas R. (2009). “Economy of Words”. Cultural Anthropology, Vol. 24, Nº 3, pp. 381–419.
Hoover, Kevin D. (1988). The New Classical Macroeconomics: A Sceptical Inquiry. Oxford, Blackwell.
Hoover, Kevin D. (1994). “Econometrics as observation: the Lucas critique and the nature of econometric inference”. Journal of Economic Methodology, Vol. 1, Nº 1, pp. 66-80.
Hoover, Kevin D. (2006) “Microfoundations and the Ontology of Macroeconomics”, en Cinference o Issues in the Philosophy of Economics, University of Alabama, Birmingham, 19-21 May 2006.
Hoover, Kevin D. (2008). Idealizing reduction: The microfoundations of macroeconomics, documento electrónico: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1139918, acceso 5 de junio.
Keynes, J.M. (1926). “Francis Ysidro Edgeworth, 1845–1926”, Economic Journal, Vol. 36, Nº 141, pp. 140–53.
Keynes, J.M. (1936). The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money. London, Macmillan.
King, J. E. (2008). “Microfoundations?”. En Hein, E., Niechoj, T. and Stochammer, E. (eds.): Macroeconomic Policies on Shaky Foundations. Marburg, Metropolis, pp 33-53.
King, J. E. (2012). The Microfoundations Delusion: Metaphor and Dogma in the History of Macroeconomics, Cheltenham, Edward Elgar Publishing.
Klein, L.R. (1946). “Macroeconomics and the theory of rational behavior”, Econometrica, Vol. 14, Nº 2, pp. 93–108.
Kydland, Finn E. and Prescott, Edward C. (1977). “Rules Rather than Discretion: The Inconsistency of Optimal Plans.” Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 85, Nº 3, pp. 473-492.
Lawson, Tony (1995). “The ‘Lucas critique’: a generalization.” Cambridge Journal of Economics. Vol. 19, Nº 2, pp. 257-276.
Lowenberg, A. D. (1989). “Neoclassical economics as a theory of politics and institutions”. Cato Journal, Vol. 9, Nº 3, pp. 619.
Lucas, R.E. Jr (1976). “Economic Policy Evaluation: A Critique.” en Karl Brunner and Allan H. Melzer (eds.): The Phillips Curve and Labor Markets. Amsterdam, North-Holland Publishing Company.
Lucas, R.E. Jr (1977). “Understanding business cycles”, en K. Brunner and A.H. Meltzer (eds): Stabilization of the Domestic and International Economy. New York: North-Holland, pp. 7–29.
Lucas, R.E. Jr (1981), Studies in Business-Cycle Theory, Cambridge, MIT Press.
Mikolajek-Gocejna, M. (2014). Investor Expectations in Value Based Management,. Switzerland, Springer.
Modigliani, F. (1954). “Utility analysis and the consumption function: an interpretation of cross-section data”, en K.K. Kurihara (ed.): Post- Keynesian Economics. New Brunswick, NJ Rutgers University Press, pp. 388–436.
Moos, K. (2016). The Transvaluation of the Theory of Economic Policy: The Lucas Critique Reconsidered. Working Paper, May 2016. Department of Economics. The New School for Social Research.
Nemiña, P. (2015). “Acción económica e incertidumbre: el aporte de Jens Beckert a la sociología económica”. Equidad & Desarrollo, Nº 23, pp. 9-33.
Patinkin, D. (1956). Money, Interest, and Prices. Evanston, IL, Row Peterson.
Phelps, E.S. (1969), “The new microeconomics in inflation and employment theory”, American Economic Review, Vol. 59, Nº 2, pp. 147–60.
Phillips, A. W. (1958). “The relation between unemployment and the rate of change of money wage rates in the United Kingdom, 1861–1957”. Economica, Vol. 25, Nº 100, pp. 283-299.
Popper, K. R. (1991). Conjeturas y refutaciones: el desarrollo del conocimiento científico. Paidós, Ibérica.
Samuelson, Paul A. (1955). Economics (3rd ed.). Nueva York, McGraw-Hill.
Serrano, F. (2014) "El neoliberalismo como regreso de la economía vulgar". Circus. Revista Argentina de Economía, N° 6, pp. 57-74.
Smelser, N. & Swedberg, R. (2005). The handbook of economic sociology. 2nd Edition. United States, Princeton University Press.
Snowdon, B., & Vane, H. R. (2005). Modern macroeconomics: its origins, development and current state. Cheltenham, Edward Elgar Publishing.
Vercelli, A. (2016). “Microfoundations, Methodological Individualism and Alternative Economic Visions”, Review of Political Economy, Vol. 28, Nº 1, pp. 153-167.
Weintraub, S. (1957). “The micro-foundations of aggregate demand and supply”, The Economic Journal, Vol. 67, Nº 267, pp. 455-470.
