Expectations-Based Mechanisms. An interventionist account

IVAROLA LEONARDO; MARQUÉS GUSTAVO

Perpectives on epistemology of economics

CIECE

Lugar: BUENOS AIRES; Año: 2012; p. 99 - 121

During the last decade the mechanistic movement played a crucial role both in the philosophy of science and in the social sciences, albeit a bit less in the latter. This movement supports the idea that a vast variety of phenomena in the world is the result of the operation of mechanisms (Glennan, 2008). Thinking in terms of mechanisms is attractive because it allows avoiding the use of the controversial notion of laws: on one hand, the main characteristics of laws - non-temporality, universality, etc. - usually do not maintain themselves in reality (and, it is argued, even less in social sciences). On the other hand, the notion of law has a very limited usefulness in characterizing the operation of both mechanisms (Woodward, 2002) and activities involved in mechanisms (Machamer, Craver and Darden, 2000, MDC in short.) This idea is closely related to the principle of "precision" stated by Hedström and Swedberg (1998b): not looking for universal laws in social sciences, but aiming at more limited range regularities.