By Mohan Li（Class of 2028）
The lecture began with a reflection on the speaker’s long-standing engagement with the methodology of economics, with particular emphasis on the choices and trade-offs involved in theory construction. He observed that any economic model necessarily selects certain elements of reality while abstracting from others, yet there is no universally accepted criterion for determining what ought to be retained and what may be omitted. For this reason, he suggested, economic analysis is often shaped by implicit subjective judgments. He also offered a critique of the discipline’s longstanding tendency toward isolation, arguing that economics has too often excluded social, political, and psychological dimensions and, as a result, has become increasingly self-enclosed.
The lecture then turned to the relevance of psychoanalysis for economics. Drawing an analogy between the relationship of analyst and patient and that of economist and economic phenomena, he argued that the researcher and the object of inquiry are not fully separable. Economic theory, in his account, does not merely describe or shape reality; it also affects the standpoint of the theorist. By drawing on psychoanalytic insights, he invited the audience to reconsider how economic theories are formed and how they come to be accepted within the discipline.
In the final part of the lecture, he connected these methodological reflections to questions of ethics. He emphasized that economics is not only concerned with formal modeling and logical argument, but must also grapple with issues of fairness, justice, and moral constraint. Economic inquiry, he argued, cannot remain detached from pressing ethical challenges, including torture, intergenerational justice, and climate change.
Taken as a whole, the lecture conveyed a clear central message: economics must broaden its intellectual boundaries, engage more seriously with other disciplines, and confront the value commitments and ethical responsibilities that underlie scholarly research.
