Dekker correctly emphasizes that Austrian Economics is better thought of as the study of the social sciences more broadly: the study of human action and, specifically, the study of human interaction and exchange with one another- praxeology and catallactics. There were various "circles" who met regularly during the fin de siecle and inter-war eras in the many cafes of Vienna. They would argue, drink, and even sing songs, but most often they debated about the bigger questions of what made civilization tick- culture, history, institutions, and traditions. The stars of what became labeled the "Austrian School" tradition were Menger, Bohm-Bawerk, Mises, Hayek, and Schumpeter. While differing in economics widely, what largely connected them was their methodological individualism, their radical subjectivity, and their use of marginal analysis in evaluating the economy. While maintaining that economics was a value-free (social)-science, they exposited that markets were the best means of conveying dispersed information widely, through the price system. Markets contained both civilizing and restraining urges by creating a space for the communal interaction of goods and ideas. The lasting contribution of the students from Vienna was to approach economics with humility, that knowledge is too immense, too dispersed, and too diverse to be accumulated by any one man, and thus it is best for the economist to think of himself as a constant learner of partial knowledge and fragments of ideas, rather than a scientist, teacher, or technocrat. Furthermore, economics cannot be studied without studying “the stuff in between”: language, law, tradition, and history- the things that make up a culture and create a civilization.
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