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Robert H. Nelson
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Economics as Religion: From Samuelson to Chicago and Beyond Paperback – August 15, 2014

by Robert H. Nelson (Author)
3.8 3.8 out of 5 stars 13 ratings
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Robert Nelson’s Reaching for Heaven on Earth, Economics as Religion, and The New Holy Wars: Economic Religion Versus Environmental Religion in Contemporary America read almost like a trilogy, exploring and charting the boundaries of theology and economics from the Western foundations of ancient Greece through the traditions that Nelson identifies as “Protestant” and “Roman,” and on into modern economic forms such as Marxism and capitalism, as well as environmentalism. Nelson argues that economics can be a genuine form of religion and that it should inform our understanding of the religious developments of our times. This edition of Economics as Religion situates the influence of his work in the scholarly economic and theological conversations of today and reflects on the state of the economics profession and the potential implications for theology, economics, and other social sciences.

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  1. Print length
    436 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Penn State University Press
  4. Publication date
    August 15, 2014
  5. Dimensions
    6 x 1.03 x 9 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0271063769
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0271063768
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

Review

“The best recent study of the subject.”

―Samuel Brittan Financial Times



“Robert Nelson’s Economics as Religion offers a unique set of insights into the social role of the economics profession. . . . The book should be assigned reading for undergraduates in intermediate microeconomics and first-year graduate students in economics.”

―Jennifer Roback Journal of Markets and Morality



“Robert Nelson has written what may be the most important recent book on the future of the economics profession.”

―Andrew Morriss Books and Culture



“An economic theorist himself, Nelson elegantly exposes his firm understanding of the history of economic theory. . . . He is in fact perfectly at ease venturing into theological and religious history, persuasively establishing parallels between the economic and religious realms.”

―Aren E. Annus Nova Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions

About the Author

Robert H. Nelson is Professor in the School of Public Policy at the University of Maryland.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Penn State University Press; with a new Epilogue edition (August 15, 2014)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 436 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0271063769
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0271063768
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.4 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 1.03 x 9 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    3.8 3.8 out of 5 stars 13 ratings

About the author

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Robert H. Nelson

Robert H. Nelson

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Dr. Nelson is the author of many book chapters and journal articles and of eight books: The New Holy Wars: Economic Religion versus Environmental Religion in Contemporary America (Penn State University Press, 2010); Private Neighborhoods and the Transformation of Local Government (Urban Institute Press, 2005); Economics as Religion: From Samuelson to Chicago and Beyond (Penn State University Press, 2001); ); A Burning Issue: A Case for Abolishing the U.S. Forest Service (Rowman & Littlefield, 2000); Public Lands and Private Rights: The Failure of Scientific Management (Rowman & Littlefield, 1995); Reaching for Heaven on Earth: The Theological Meaning of Economics (Rowman & Littlefield, 1991); The Making of Federal Coal Policy (Duke University Press, 1983); and Zoning and Property Rights (MIT Press, 1977). The New Holy Wars was the 2010 Winner of the Grand Prize of the Eric Hoffer Book Award for the best book of the year by an independent publisher; and also silver medal winner for “Finance, Investment, Economics” of the 2010 Independent Publisher Book Awards (the “IPPYs”). Dr. Nelson has written widely in publications for broader audiences, including Forbes, The Weekly Standard, Reason, The Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Los Angeles Times, Baltimore Sun, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, and Denver Post. He worked in the Office of Policy Analysis of the Office of the Secretary of the Interior from 1975 to 1993. He has served as the senior economist of the Congressionally chartered Commission on Fair Market Value Policy for Federal Coal Leasing (Linowes Commission) and as senior research manager of the President's Commission on Privatization. He has been a visiting scholar at the Brookings Institution, visiting senior fellow at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, research associate at the Center for Applied Social Sciences of The University of Zimbabwe; visiting professor at Keio University in Tokyo; visiting professor at the Universidad Torcuato Di Tella in Buenos Aires; and visiting professor at the School of Economics of the University of the Philippines in Manila. He holds a Ph.D. in economics from Princeton University (1971).

Areas of Writing and Research:

Dr. Nelson is a nationally recognized authority in the areas of (1) local zoning and property rights to housing in the United States; (2) the use and management of the public lands owned by the federal government in the American West; and (3) the normative foundations of economics and environmentalism and their often clashing ways of thinking about the world. He is a member of the environmental policy specialization of the School of Public Policy.

Customer reviews

3.8 out of 5 stars
13 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Clay Garner
5.0 out of 5 stars ''Secular religions - usually grounded in in scientific claims - are actual categories of religion'' - page xxiii
Reviewed in the United States on June 29, 2016
Verified Purchase
This work deserves ten stars. Clear, persuasive, cogent, erudite. Uses history, religion, economics, politics as springboard to surprising conclusions. Neither arrogant nor fawning, Nelson offers insight that looks beneath the surface of common thinking. Presents both sides of many opinions. Well done. Contents -

Introduction: The market paradox

One - The laws of Economics as the new Word of God
1. Tenets of Economic Faith
2. A secular great awakening

Part Two - Theological Messages of Samuelson's Economics
3. The market mechanism as religious statement
4. Apostle of scientific management

Part Three - The Gods of Chicago
5. Frank Knight and original sin
6. Knight vs Friedman vs Stigler
7. Chicago vs the Ten Commandments

Part Four - Religion and the new institutional economics
8. A new economic world
9. Efficient religion

Part Five - Economics as Religion
10. God bless the market
11. A crisis of progress

Conclusion

Nelson explains in the preface that this book grew out of his work as an economist for the interior department. ''Indeed, the conflicts between economic and environmental values that dominated many of the policy outcomes during my years at the interior department are best understood as new variations on earlier religious disagreements among followers in branches of Jewish and Christian religion.'' (xxii) Preconceived ideas are difficult to see - and harder to change.

''There is a growing recognition at the beginning of the twenty first century that secular religions - usually grounded in scientific claims - are actual categories of religion, often now competing directly with more traditional faiths. . . . Robert Bellah finds that 'we can say that in contemporary society social science has usurped the traditional position of theology.' '' (xxii)

''This book, then, offers a theological exegesis of the contents of modern economic thought, regarding economic thinking as not only a source of technical understanding of economic events, but also for many economists and noneconmists alike a source of ultimate understanding of the world. It is a new kind of theological study of the most powerful set of religious beliefs, as I have come to conclude, of the modern era.'' (xxv) Nelson provides convincing evidence.

On page 266 Nelson offers a summary -

1. By the modern age traditional religion in the Judeo-Christian sense had lost much of its earlier authority in public life, thus posing a large transaction cost problem for the functioning of economic (as well as other) institutions in society.

2. Following Isaac Newton, much of the authority of traditional religion was transferred to science. Science became the dispenser of valid truth claims, and in this respect scientific knowledge was now seen as having the greatest religious authority in modern society.

3. Since the physical sciences had little to say about human affairs, the social sciences moved to and were successful in assuming the mantle of science - and also acquired the religious authority of science in matters of the economy, politics, and other spheres of social action.

4. Social science thus became the religion of the modern age . . .

5. As religious hopes for a secular salvation increasingly turned to economic events. . .

6. The success of economics in its religious function was to a significant extent independent of the degree of validity in the specific truth claims produced by economics as an analytical science - and in cases such as Marxism . . .

7. . . Economics as religion has been incapable of answering in a satisfactory way many of the fundamental questions that religion historically has been asked to address.

Easy to read, nevertheless, the switch Nelson makes from 'proven science' to 'theological insight' could be difficult for some.

Thirty one pages of excellent notes, eight page index. No photographs.
6 people found this helpful
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umlungu
1.0 out of 5 stars Kindle Edition: end notes not active
Reviewed in the United States on May 7, 2011
Verified Purchase
This note relates to the kindle edition.
The content by the author is excellent. Amazon's conversion is not.

The text contains numbered endnotes. These notes are not active. The footnotes, marked with an * are active, and the numbered endnotes in the Introduction are active so its technically easy.
The only explanation is pure laziness by the Amazon staff who converted the text.
Since one can't flip easily to the end of the book as to check the contents of an endnote as one can with a deadwood copy, nor can one access the endnotes via the menu, this makes reading the content of an endnote very difficult. One must write down a note on paper that when one reaches the end of the book that one should check an endnote. That makes using the Kindle edition less convenient than using the deadwood version.
5 people found this helpful
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Aurelian Dochia
5.0 out of 5 stars Enlightening
Reviewed in the United States on January 8, 2013
Verified Purchase
IN the last few years I was puzzled when seeing economists cannot agree on basic issues like what caused the crisis and what are the adequate remedies. Keynesian, Monetarist and Austrian schools of thought for example interpret the same facts in different ways to come out with conclusions that are frequently opposite. And nobody admits others may be right.
Robert Nelson's book made me understand that the great economists positions are driven by deep values, convictions, models of reasoning and mythical stories which have a religious essence and are embraced with a quasi-religious fervor.
This is a great book for whoever wants to take a peak through the veil of mathematical models, statistics and charts of economists' writings.
4 people found this helpful
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Amazon Customer
4.0 out of 5 stars Understanding Economics
Reviewed in the United States on November 15, 2001
Ever wonder how the field of economics could produce such disparate voices, from interventionists such as John Maynard Keynes to the classical liberalism of Milton Friedman? Those looking for insights will do well to read Economics as Religion: From Samuelson to Chicago and Beyond by Robert H. Nelson, an economist at the University of Maryland.
As the book's subtitle suggests, Nelson takes the reader on tour of modern economic thought. Here he's done commendable job, providing a highly readable account of the major personalities. This book will appeal to historians as well as the informed non-specialist. Nelson ranges far and wide in his effort to explore the often unstated philosophical assumptions behind supposedly objective economic analysis. Of particular interest is Nelson's treatment of the rift between economists and environmentalists. He places the debate squarely (and rightly in my opinion) in religious terms. While this is not particularly original, he does a service by reinforcing the deep religious roots of modern American environmentalism.
Finally, in an increasingly small world, Nelson again hammers home a vital point regarding economic opportunity provided by free markets: Economic progress requires the creation of a "civil society" and the rule of law. Social and human capital must be both nurtured and sustained. Laws must reflect these norms and governments must enforce them fairly. Without these, human rights and the environment suffer.
In environments of rampant corruption and political instability, value creating institutions aren't sustained. Success comes when people are rewarded for creating value, not for transferring wealth via force or fraud. Political plunderers, not the market process, keeps countries poor.
This is a desperately important message at a time when many equivocate and ring their hands about the spread of Western democracy as, "a hegemonic discourse of Western cultural imperialism".
Pete Geddes is Program Director of the Foundation for Research on Economics and the Environment (FREE) and Gallatin Writers. Both are based in Bozeman, Montana.
51 people found this helpful
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