Soros Commits $5 Million for “Innovative” Oxford Economics Institute

George Soros is to create a new economics institute at Oxford University.

It is part of an attempt to steer the discipline away from the champions of the free market and deregulation who, the billionaire financier believes, share the blame for the global economic crisis…

George Soros is to create a new economics institute at Oxford University.

George Soros is to create a new economics institute at Oxford University.

It is part of an attempt to steer the discipline away from the champions of the free market and deregulation who, the billionaire financier believes, share the blame for the global economic crisis…

George Soros is to create a new economics institute at Oxford University.

It is part of an attempt to steer the discipline away from the champions of the free market and deregulation who, the billionaire financier believes, share the blame for the global economic crisis…

“The economic crisis and the failure of economists to predict it and protect society illustrate that economics as a profession needs to re-earn its reputation and regain its mantle of expertise,” [br]

Robert Johnson, a former managing director at Soros Fund Management, who is now director of the New York-based Institute for New Economic Thinking (Inet),

said to the Times of London, which is soon to be firewalled on the net by its owner, Rupert Murdoch.

Oxford was chosen for the first institute because Mr Soros believed that Britain was more open to broadening the economic debate than the US, Mr Johnson said.

“There’s a feeling when we talk to Mervyn King and Paul Tucker [the Deputy Governor] at the Bank of England, Adair Turner at the Financial Services Authority and others, that they are way ahead of the others.

“We want to go to a climate where the minds are open. We find the climate in the UK to be much more conducive to change.

“In the US the orthodoxy is a little bit more embedded. What the FSA is writing is far more courageous than anything emanating from the US Treasury.”

In addition, the university system of tenure and peer review gave established academics a virtual stranglehold on the debate and made it difficult for economists trying to promote a fresh approach to be heard… [br] [Interestingly enough, we created precisely such an institution in the late 90s, and even made contact with the Soros Foundation in New York.

But apparently that’s going a little TOO far out of the box for the enigmatic Mr. Soros 😉 ]

Even now, more than 18 months after the start of the credit crunch, some freemarket economists appeared to be in denial about the causes of the crisis and there was no consensus about what to do next, Johnson said.

Too much of modern economic theory relied on sophisticated mathematical models to predict market behaviour.

A broader, interdisciplinary approach to economics, taking in history, psychology, natural science — to deal with issues such as climate change — and even literature was now needed, Mr Johnson suggested.

[Which was EXACTLY what we created … hmmmm ]

Inet is talking to Cambridge as well as higher education universities in Germany, France, China, Italy and the United States, where there have been discussions under way with Princeton, Columbia and New York University.

[Ahhhh … I guess that explains it … 😉 … he wants “innovation”,

and yet he is dealing ONLY with institutions where “success” is defined PRECISELY by one’s adherence to the prevailing orthodoxies … 😉 ] …

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Good idea, I guess, but Soros’ problem seems to be his analysis of what’s WRONG with existing institutions is usually on the mark —

but he really seems to lack courage and vision when it comes to his proposed “solutions” …

We’ll see if anything comes of this … but don’t get your hopes up … 😉 …