Cultural Considerations within Austrian Economics

Austrian cultural economics offers a unique approach to the study of culture in economic life.

Virgil Storr (Author), Arielle John (Author)

9781108708166, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 9 July 2020

75 pages
15 x 23 x 0.5 cm, 0.11 kg

Increasingly, economists realize that a deeper understanding of culture can improve their insights into the most important questions in economics. The Austrian school of political economy, which has always taken economics to be a science of meaning, and therefore, a science of culture, offers a unique approach to the study of culture in economic life. We consider three important differences between these Austrian and non-Austrian approaches: the Austrian focus on culture as meaning rather than culture as norms, beliefs, or attitudes; the Austrian emphasis on culture as an interpretative lens rather than as a tool or form of capital; and the Austrian insistence that cultural analysis be a qualitative exercise rather than a quantitative one. We also examine Geertz's description of culture, Gadamer's approach to hermeneutics, and Weber's interpretative sociology, demonstrating their connections to the Austrian approach and offering examples of what Austrian cultural economics can look like.

1. Introduction
2. The intellectual roots of the Austrian approach to culture
3. Non-Austrian approaches to exploring the relationship between culture and economic action
4. Unique features of the Austrian approach to studying the relationship between culture and economic action
5. Studying culture in the Austrian tradition
6. Conclusion.

Subject Areas: Economic systems & structures [KCS], International economics [KCL], Economics [KC]