The Philosophy of the Austrian School (Hardcover)

In recent years the Austrian School has been an important contributor to the social sciences. In spite of this significant input, however, attempts to understand it have remained locked in a polemical frame. This text challenges that approach. Raimondo Cubeddu presents a philosophically-based account of the School's methodological, political and economic ideas. While acknowledging the evident divergences between the key figures, the study traces important similarities between Menger, Mises and Hayek. In particular, the work examines their shared conviction that the theory of subjective value and notions of spontaneous order would revolutionize the philosophical premises of the social sciences and the very basis of political philosophy. In analyzing the course of thought, the author establishes that the unity of the Austrian School was based on a shared theory about the limits of human knowledge. Drawn together, this theory constitutes an important avenue of research in the social sciences and a major reformulation of liberal ideology.