Reframing Economics

Roger A. McCain, Professor Emeritus, School of Economics, LeBow College of Business, Drexel University, USA

• Contents: 1. Introduction Part I: How People Work Together 2. Production: The Benefit of Working Together 3. Game Theory: Problems of Working Together 4. Exchange: How Difference Enriches Us 5. Further Benefits of Working Together: Sharing Risk Part II: Information is Not Free 6. Information is Not Free 7. Governance 8. A Grand Coalition of the Whole Society 9. Macroeconomics 10. Political Economy Index

‘For most of the 20th century economists focused on competition as the driving force of the modern capitalist economy. In his thoughtful and readable book, Roger A. McCain offers a different frame of reference for economists. Using game theory’s distinction between cooperative and non-cooperative games, he defines economics as the study of the development of cooperative agreements in the economy and the failure to bring them about. Orthodox economists who think in terms of a competitive model and heterodox economists who adhere to a class conflict paradigm will both find their ideas challenged by McCain’s new frame that sees mature capitalism as the result of class compromise based on an imperfectly cooperative game.’