From the Archive: F A Hayek's Nobel at 50: then and now

2024 marks the 50th anniversary of the Nobel Prize won by liberal political economist F.A. Hayek. This lecture will review some of Hayek’s key ideas and especially his contributions to the methodology of the social sciences. It will feature Bruce Caldwell, a leading historian of economic thought, author of a recently released book Hayek: A Life, 1899–1950.

The lecture will focus on Hayek’s time at LSE as well as his contributions on how best to pursue economic science.

In his famous Nobel speech, Hayek criticized the influence of scientism in the social sciences. He argued that the complexity of social phenomena cannot be captured through mechanistic models that attempt to predict human action with scientific precision. Caldwell will discuss Hayek's challenge to the scientific community to recognise the limits of what we can accomplish in the social sciences, particularly when one studies a complex adaptive system like the economy. He will show how Hayek came to hold the views he did, their reception, and their implications for how we study economics and think about social and economic policy.