The poverty of mainstream economics: a systematic critique

This paper contends that the project of mainstream economics ought to be understood through the totality of its systemic delusion to reveal its failings as a societal science. I argue that this systematic delusion springs from and is sustained by two interrelated systems. I construct a framework of mainstream economics that integrates its ideological foundations with its methodological pillars, which I refer to as system I and system II of the mainstream project. First, I document the process of the ideological evolution (sub-system IA) of mainstream economics from the Classicals to the present to demonstrate that the mainstream has consistently served the capitalist system. Second, I argue that this service is made possible through the obstinate use of homo economicus (sub-system IIA) and the dogmatic insistence on mathematical formalism (sub-system IIB), despite their incompatibility with the true behavior of social individuals. Lastly, I expose how the intellectual cartel of mainstream economists (sub-system IB) at various levels of the capitalist social system marginalizes those outside the cartel. In this vicious circular project, the intellectual cartel upholds the capitalist ideology by committing to analytical rigor that does not necessarily engage with concrete material reality.