The Economic Metaphor between the Mechanical and the Organic Paradigm
Asist. univ. drd. Teodora GHIVIRIGĂ
Universitatea“AL. I.Cuza”, Iasi
The term metaphor in association with science still strikes as a slightly inappropriate word match as it s associated mainly with the literary type of text, remote, therefore, from the objectivity expected from the exact sciences. The paper analyses a sample of economic text according to Lakoff's concept of ontological metaphor and identifies the mechanical metaphor as all pervasive. The image of economics as a tool is revelatory of a positivist attitude of the authors in commenting on economic theories and illustrative of a cultural stand that informs the view of economics as rather an exact science than one among the social sciences.
The term metaphor in association with science, although gaining ever more ground in language studies and attracting the interest of linguists as well as scientists, still strikes as a far-fetched, even slightly inappropriate word match. Metaphor continues to carry the full weight of the association with the literary type of text - especially poetry, the epitome of a subjective vision of the world, being therefore evaluated as an individualistic self-serving verbal creation, rather remote in scope from the objectivity boasted by modern sciences (I use the term modern and modernity having in mind a possible association with that of postmodern and postmodernity and the subsequent shift towards its relativization and the deconstruction of the myth of scientific objectivity in the trend in the philosophy of science inaugurated by Thomas Kuhn in his book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions). If not a trope of the poetic diction, then a form of conventional worn-off every-day language, whose freshness has been lost to the extent to which it can be termed - using a metaphor, and a derogatory one for that matter - as dead metaphor.[1] The point to be extracted from these statements is that scientists themselves are reticent in accepting the idea that science and the scientific idiom may be in some way indebted to metaphoric language, fearing that the rhetorical force implied in it might impair on its credibility.
The reaction against this standpoint came around the 60s with the theories of Max Black who for the first time emphasized the conceptual role of the metaphor and its contribution to - not only language - but thought also. One important step ahead was made with Lakoff and Johnson who, in their book Metaphors We Live By, demonstrated that metaphor is not marginal or accidental, but that it is actually essential to thinking and understanding This idea holds an important significance for the approach in this paper as the authors emphasize not only the connection between language and thought, but also between these and behaviour. This bears particular relevance for the field under discussion, namely economics, and its epistemological oscillation between the social sciences, to which it is related as part of the social studies on the one hand, and the 'hard core' of the exact sciences - such as physics and mathematics especially - whose status economics have long yearned for on account of their assumed objectivity. The latter represented a model for its capacity to formulate laws and principles of universal applicability and for the reliability of the instruments it provides. However, this status as a member of the exclusive club of the exact sciences has been repeatedly questioned lately - a threat to the very foundations of the economic thought. This particular standpoint is presented very clearly, though radically, in an essay The Dismal Mind - Economics as a Pretension to Science: 'Economics is not an exact science, nor can it ever be. This is because its "raw material" (humans and their behaviour as individuals and en masse) is not exact. It will never yield any natural laws or universal constants (like physics). Rather, it is a branch of the psychology of masses. It deals with the decisions humans make. Richard Thaler, the prominent economist, argues that a model of human cognition should lie at the heart of every economic theory. In other words, he regards economics as an extension of psychology.' Criticism has also been expressed coming from the "opposite" side, that of the humanities; in an essay discussing one of George Soros' articles on capitalism, the anthropologist Claude Karnoouh remarks that "transformarea teoriei economice a 'laissesz-faire'-ului în 'legi' naturale antrenează incapacitatea de a regăsi subiectul social în efectele pe care aceste 'legi' le cauzează"[2] (Karnoouh, 2000: 117). I have used these extensive quotes to establish the relation and interdependence between the elements of a chain: language - metaphor - economics - behaviour and to explain my interest in the metaphors of the economic jargon as they reflect their impact on the shaping of the economic paradigm: in other words, of the intellectual attitude of the economists towards their subject matter as revealed by the language (and images) they choose.
The Economy of the Metaphor
I should not bring into discussion the basic premise of the book Metaphors We Live By, namely that 'Our ordinary conceptual system, in terms which we both think and act, is fundamentally metaphorical in nature.' (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980: 3). Nor should I question its definition of metaphor as ' the understanding of one thing in terms of another' (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980: 5). This is not the element the originality of their approach relies on; the poet Owen Barfield, for instance, had explained figurative language some four decades earlier as the fusing together of two different conceptual spheres ' into one simple meaning,' (My criticism of the theory would regard its anglo-centrism, as the examples that the argument relies on are selected from English only and I would find the same concepts harder to apply to Romanian; for instance ' up is good, down is bad' in the UP - DOWN conceptual set in a language such as Romanian, where there are no phrasals to build with the aid of the two particles, although similarly constructed phrases can still be found.)
There are two important aspects of the theory on metaphor as presented by Lakoff and Johnson that bear relevance to the issue under discussion here. The first one is the sistematicity of the metaphor, by which it is meant that each important one creates around it ' a coherent system rather than a number of isolated cases.'(Lakoff & Johnson, 1980:17), that each such system functions around certain polarities which are part and parcel of our way of experiencing the world and that a metaphor proves its vitality by extending its sphere of applicability and by revealing more sides of the initial analogy. Moreover, they argue, the very act of revealing certain aspects of the two domains involves hiding others; this selection is operated according to a set of lenses that are of a cultural nature - this is the second aspect that I have used in my approach. By applying both of them to an article in a specialised journal, I shall try to demonstrate the systematic character of the metaphor around the polarity mechanical - organic and also the cultural nature of the preeminence of the former over the latter.
Economics and the Metaphor
Is metaphor necessary for science? This is one question that has been implicitly answered as scientific metaphors have evolved and extended and transcended the boundaries between sciences. Yet, the complex character of the most remarkable - and hence culturally powerful and fertile - ones have even led to the questioning of their status. A separation has been operated between the two modes of analogy: metaphor as applicable to poetic language and model as applicable to scientific theory. (Avădanei, 11994: 60). The fact that such 'theoretical models' have no material basis other than language itself - as opposed to iconic and scale models - justifies it, I think, to retain this type of trope as metaphor.
It has been noticed that such models or metaphors circulate between various sciences, sometimes returning in an unexpected way to their source[3]; They are examples which clearly prove how one and the same vehicle may lend itself to the representation of two different concepts in two different sciences. Other quoted examples are Dewey's vision of the heart and vascular system as a hydraulic pump, the relation between languages - especially the Indo-European ones - as members of a family among which various degrees of relationship are established; and, more recently, the soft/program seen as an organism attacked by viruses.
A more complex situation is that of the basic tenet of liberalism derived by economics from natural sciences, namely from the Darwinian theory of natural selection 'of the fittest' through competition; it s, perhaps, worth mentioning that Darwin himself is supposed to have borrowed the idea from the liberal theories in economics and politics sprouting in his time. I have resorted to such lengthy exemplification for two reasons: first, to give an idea of the complexity and systematic character of this type of scientific metaphor; secondly, to introduce the two conceptual polarities around which they gravitate: the organic - the tree, the organism attacked by viruses, and the mechanical- the clockwork, the pump, water (in its mechanical impact and not in its organicity as far as composition is concerned as an environment adequate to foster life). It would be also worth remarking on the obvious disproportion in number and complexity between the two. This polarity has been noticed by Donald McCloskey (McCloskey 1986: 74), who also poses the problem of suitability asking 'whether a mechanical or a biological analogy best suits the economy as a whole.'
The article I have chosen for exemplification and discussion seemed most appropriate for two reasons: for one thing, it centres round several stages in the development of economics, thus leading to the very core of the economic science as a pilot for its various branches. The second reason is that, by the very language it uses to describe and investigate the theories presented, it discloses the authors' personal perspective on the theories and on the process of economic discovery at large. As the quotations will demonstrate, the article reveals surprising stylistic homogeneity and expressivity in a type of text which is largely considered as stylistically dry and inexpressive, where any display of personal attitude or individual affective involvement in the object is disparagingly disavowed as unprofessional.
For the sake of method, metaphors in the text can basically be divided into accidental and systematic metaphors. The accidental ones play no important part in the shaping of the authors' conception of economics as a system or of the theories analyzed. Rather, they supposedly belong to their personal use of language: 'The notion that neoclassical economics experienced a tripartite immaculate conception around 1870.' (p. 198); the source is religious. Such metaphors occur occasionally and I may appreciate that they represent instances of the authors' non-scientific idiolect, not necessarily triggered by or connected with the field of economics.
The second type of metaphors is relevant for the authors' idiom by its frequency and systematicity; it is by these two criteria - frequency and systematicity - that we may infer that they inform the very view that represents the ground of their mental paradigm and can, therefore, offer insight into the workings of the metaphor in the economic (con)text. This second type consists of structural metaphors grouped around two basic images: 'economics is a mechanism (which needs tools for its maintenance)' and, secondly, 'economic theory is a battle'. Our discussion will centre round the former set of metaphors.
The term 'tool' is not necessarily surprising in itself and neither does it appear as an extravagance in this particular text. References to all sorts of instruments - the financial balance defined precisely as a "financial instrument", for instance - are made in various economic texts and they do not strike as remarkable: for one thing, they parallel a similar use of the same term in other sciences which refers to specific procedures devised to support a certain operation; for another, it bears the mark of unspecificity and abstraction. As evidence to support this idea, it is interesting to note that Webster's Encyclopedic defines it as '1. a mechanical device or contrivance, tool, implement; 3. that with or by which something is effected, means, agency'; the etymology of the term is Middle English < Latin instrumentum. This term appears in the text only once, in its adjectival form as 'instrumental': 'Marshall was instrumental in laying the groundwork for that method.' The term which is consistently used in the text is tool and its systematicity is, as I mentioned before, proved by the frequency of occurrence (12 times in a 16-page text of which 5 consist of extensive charts with almost no prose) and by the varied structures in which it occurs. Not only does it appear as such, but the 'tool' image is expanded throughout the text in a multitude of forms: the authors speak about a ' process of collecting and inventing tools' (p. 198) and once again in the same sentence, where the tools are' directed by a force'; value was derived from demand ' by mathematical tools' (p. 202); Elled - a neoclassical economist - forged ' a number of new analytical tools' (p.205); further on, 'the fundamental tools of neoclassic analysis' are mentioned (p. 205); economics is seen as a ' machine' which needs ' verbal and graphical tools' (p. 207); neoclassical economics consists of ' a scientific method as well as of a set of tools' (p.208); another economist - Jevons - also participated in the process of shaping 'his theoretical tools' (p. 212). Mere isolated tools are not enough for the exercise of economics; they must be in sufficient number and in sets or kits where they are organised according to types of the operations they can perform and cover the whole range of possible malfunctions: 'In all these ways, the economists' toolkit was remarkably full' (p. 198); a ' theoretical toolkit ' appears in Marshall's principles (p. 206) and he also contributed to ' codifying the toolkit of neoclassical economics' (p. 207); it is mentioned that ' this toolkit existed before Menger' (p. 208). And more examples can be offered. I have chosen to copiously quote - at the risk of making my text tedious - in order to give a correct idea about the density of metaphor and the persistence of the image. The noun phrases numerically exceed the verbal phrases, but the latter are not altogether absent: they are related to the activities that can be performed by means of the above mentioned contrivances: arguments are ' encased' in the context (p. 210) and the reader - I think - can even visualise the greasy, yet orderly tool box. In some other place, Thünen 'did not attempt to encase his theory in a strict theoretical framework.' (p. 209). As mentioned in a sentence already quoted earlier in the text, where the focus was, however, different, such tools are ' forged' and the sheer preference for this highly material/industrial way of processing over any other possible synonyms is telling about the paradigm revealed. An economist called Whewell 'articulated' a theory of value (p. 198); the example may not contribute much as an argument, since the dictionary definition of ' to articulate ' has both an abstract meaning, with direct reference to a system of thought (to bring the various parts into a meaningful and coherent relation) and a concrete one easily associated to what one is supposed to do with our already familiar toolkit. More relevant would be, in this case, the term assemblage ('Many writers of different nationalities contributed to the assemblage of microeconomics principles' p. 198). The dictionary definition gives preeminence to the concrete meaning (to put or fit together; put together the parts of) with the strikingly congruous example to assemble a toy from a kit! As stated at the beginning of this discussion, the use of the term instrument is neither surprising, nor singular in the scientific discourse, but the obvious predilection for the concrete term tool (defined as a contrivance held in and worked by the hand for assisting the work of esp. mechanics or labourers) over the (more) abstract one may make the substance of further analysis. To add one last touch to the concrete, rather than abstract, character of the perspective, the authors indicate that the force guiding the tools does not ' materialise' until a certain moment, meaning that it does not become fully effective, as the context clarifies it. It is also worth mentioning in this line of argument that it is not the term instrument, but tool which is commonly lexically associated with both kit and mechanic (with reference to the occupation), thus adding to the mechanical paradigm.