Rationalities of ignorance

On Financial Crisis and the Ambivalence of Neo-Liberal Epistemology

Datos Bibliográficos

ID2159596
AutoresWilliam Davies (0000-0003-1830-5403), Linsey Mcgoey (0000-0002-4404-2574)
Año2012
Volumen41
Número1
Páginas64-83
Fecha de publicación2012-02-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaEconomy and Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0308-5147 • E-ISSN: 1469-5766
EditorialInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/03085147.2011.637331
OpenAlexW2117553504
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas68
Referencias citadas25

The financial crisis of 2007–8 was experienced and reflected upon as a crisis of knowledge, the perennial question being why nobody accurately understood the risks that were being taken within the financial sector. In the wake of the crisis, there have been demands that rational economic knowledge be extended further and more vigorously, to prevent such ignorance being possible in future. At the same time, there have been demands for a new, softer rationalism, which factors in the possibility of errors and systemic complexities. What neither approach recognizes is that ignorance is not simply the absence of rational economic knowledge, but is a productive force in itself, something that is actively nurtured and exploited, both by neo-liberal theorists such as Hayek and by expert actors who have been implicated in the financial crisis. We explore how ignorance has been alternately an albatross, a commodity and an institutional alibi to financial actors and the scholars who study them

Economics · Financial crisis · Ignorance · Keynesian economics · Political economy · Political science · Positive economics · Sociology · Banking stability, regulation, efficiency · Economic Theory and Policy · Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism · Law