What a shame that the plug was pulled on accreditation of the heterodox economics course organised by the Manchester University students (Editorial, 3 April). As you point out, insights and breakthroughs in the emergence of an economics fit for the 21st century are coming from many disciplines – anthropology, sociology, psychology, neuroscience, etc – but all too rarely from within economics faculties themselves.
Despite this most recent setback in Manchester, however, the citadels of economics orthodoxy have been breached and a wave of innovative new academic programmes is emerging. These include a postgraduate programme here at Schumacher College that would be recognised not just by the 18th and 19th century moral philosophers that you cite, but also by more recent thinkers following in the footsteps of Rachel Carson and Fritz Schumacher who recognise the economy as being embedded not just within social and political structures but, also and more broadly, within the web of life in which human society is but one thread.
Head of economics, Schumacher College
• Behind the shield of mathematical formalism, economics has given remarkably little attention to its hidden moral assumptions. Only very recently has the American Economic Association agreed to implement even a very modest ethical code for people submitting papers to its journals. Yet economists have more influence over people's life chances than all other social scientists. Doctors and engineers have similar influence, and both professions devote attention to morals and ethics. Let us hope that the disruption you predict will lead economists to engage with the ethical duties appropriate for such a discipline.
Professor Robert H. Wade
London School of Economics