Celebrating 15 years of ICAE—an unlikely success story of heterodox resilience, intellectual courage, and groundbreaking research thriving against the academic mainstream.
Contrary to current trends almost everywhere else, this issue of the Heterodox Economics Newsletter brings some good news. While this is fantastic it comes with the drawback that a long editorial emerged out of my enthusiasm; hope that is OK 😅.
Heterodox Economics Newsletter
Der Heterodox Economics Newsletter wird herausgegeben von Jakob Kapeller und erscheint im dreiwöchentlichen Rhythmus mit Neuigkeiten aus der wissenschaftlichen Community multiparadigmatischer ökonomischer Ansätze. Der Newsletter richtet sich an einen Kreis von mehr als 7.000 Empfänger*innen und zählt schon weit mehr als 250 Ausgaben.
First and foremost, it should be noted that the Institute for Comprehensive Analysis of the Economy (ICAE) at Johannes Kepler University Linz – one of the two institutional homes of the Newsletter – celebrates its 15 anniversary these days. Born in 2009/2010 from the rubble of the global financial crisis, ICAE emerged as an institutional response to mainstream economics’ spectacular failure. Over time it has evolved into a thriving heterodox outpost that has survived and flourished in an academic landscape hostile to non-mainstream economic thinking. Thereby, ICAE draws on the rich tradition of heterodox economics in Austria – which is described in greater detail in the superb book on an Alternative Austrian Economics by John E. King – as well as a pluralist approach to economics at University of Linz that started in the 1970s with eminent figures like Kurt W. Rothschild (see also here) or Kazimierz Laski, but has largely faded in the early 2000s – with the economics department becoming more and more mainstream.
As a consequence, ICAE has been set up at the margins: as an externally financed research institute that was always strongly dependent on external funding often creating immense institutional pressure, financial uncertainty and precarious work arrangements. With successful grant applications as our primary means of survival we often felt like Star Trek’s Jem Hadar, who live by the motto “victory is life”, when realizing that it is the next application that will decide, whether we sustain or must dissolve. This setup put a lot of pressure on our staff, and I am truly thankful for all those people who joined this slightly uphill battle over the years.
Conceptually, the ICAE follows the beforementioned pluralist tradition associated with Rothschild, where pluralism is not understood as polite tolerance, but as a genuine conviction that understanding complex social systems requires multiple theoretical lenses and constant dialogue across paradigmatic boundaries (see here, here or here). ICAE’s research agenda addresses the very questions that arise from this focus; over time it encompasses analyses of sources and consequences of financial (in)stability (e.g. here or here), studies on the role of economists as experts and economic models in policy-making (e.g. here, here, here or here), works trying to illuminate pluralist teaching, research strategies and theoretical concepts (e.g. here or here) as well as contributions to analyzing convergence and polarization in international trade (e.g. here , here or here) as well as wealth inequality, wealth taxation and hidden networks of the hyper-rich (e.g. here or here). Moreover, at ICAE we often take an interdisciplinary meta-perspective focusing on discursive practices that become performative and perpetuate societal inequalities (e.g. here or here) and Social Studies of Economics, that reflect the role of economists and the power of economics as a discipline in society (e.g. here, hereand here). Recent efforts are directed towards the challenge of implementing a socio-ecological transformation to confront climate change and other ecological challenges, which requires new economic thinking (see here or here for some early efforts).
Yet what strikes me most is precisely ICAE’s David-vs-Goliath quality. As indicated, this is not some well-endowed research unit with powerful political connections and media access, but a small institute at a mid-sized Austrian university, staffed largely by young researchers on temporary contracts, producing rigorous work that challenges powerful interests. When ICAE researchers investigate wealth concentration, critique competition as an organizing principle, or expose how rankings shape economic science, they’re not cushioned by institutional prestige or ideological alignment with dominant political forces. Its societal engagement distinguishes ICAE from academic institutes that sometimes tend to treat economics as an intellectual game – e.g., by contributing to public debates about wealth taxes, analyzing Austria’s mobility transition, or hosting this Newsletter for the global heterodox community. By doing so ICAE consistently demonstrates that heterodox economics isn’t just about getting the argument right, but also about contributing to struggles for more just, democratic, and sustainable economic systems.
ICAE’s persistence signifies a form of resistance. In an era of research assessment exercises, citation metrics, and „excellence“ rankings that systematically marginalize heterodox work, simply surviving is no small achievement. Thriving – producing excellent research, training PhD students, hosting conferences, serving the community – borders on the miraculous 🚀. We are super-thankful that continued success – e.g., in the form of the renowned START grant from the Austrian Science Fund for a project connecting the challenge of socio-ecological transformation with economic reasoning– has served to successively improve our institutional position, which now makes life at ICAE less precarious (although no less dynamic 😎). However, as many of you know from first-hand experience these sources can vanish as quickly as they come. So here’s to ICAE: may the next fifteen years bring continued excellence, even deeper involvement with societal needs and, as in the past, a lot of fun, while doing the right thing. The margins, it turns out, might be exactly where the most important work happens 😉.
On top of this nice and hopefully somewhat inspiring story, some institutional progress has also been made on the side of the Newsletter. For one, we have managed to implement a minor update on the Heterodox Economics Directory, which brings some correction and extensions. For another, I am happy to report that we successfully created a charitable organization (the “International Association for Heterodox Economics and Political Economy”) that serves as an institutional backbone for the Newsletter. Some subscribers have already joined this organization to provide continued support for our work and infrastructure. If you are also interested in joining please write us a short email so we can supply you with the necessary details. Alternatively, you can also donate via PayPal to show your support for our reliable and diligent service 😁.
Many thanks for reading all this and best
