Editorial: IJSE valedictory editorial

I would like to express my thanks for having had the opportunity of acting as Editor and Executive Editor of the IJSE since 2011. The torch was handed to me by Professor Leslie Armour, a remarkable individual and philosopher, who is sorely missed. In the early days, I worked in tandem with Professor Colin Tyler. It took us a while to learn the ropes, to find our way around the system, to attune ourselves to the beat of the journal and its contributors and reviewers. For the past four years, I have acted as executive editor admirably supported an excellent team of associate editors. I would like to thank all those who have worked with me on the journal over the past ten or so years, including all of the administrative staff and commissioning editors, especially Clare Lehane, with whom I have worked efficiently and amicably over the past couple of years.

Earlier I mentioned the “beat” of the journal. That word was intended to refer not only to its workings and the inner mysteries of administration, scrutiny and reviewing, but also to what the journal is, what it is for: what, in other words, is social economics?

What makes the IJSE distinctive is what makes social economics distinctive. But what is it that makes social economics distinctive? This is not an easy question to answer: we might know social economics when we see it, but it is a lot harder to give a clear principled statement of precisely what we are seeing. Clearly social economics is a branch of economics. More specifically, it has to do with the social dimension of economic activity. Does this make the term interchangeable with socioeconomics? Many think not. Does it mean that any piece of economics which refers to the “social” is social economics? Again, the answer is no.

In characterising social economics the key terms are, on the one hand, “economic” and “social” and on the other, “activity”. All economics is ultimately resolvable into activity: but at a certain level of aggregation, the link with individual freely chosen activity is ignored (for sound analytic reasons). Social economics, by contrast, by focussing attention on social and economic activity, draws our attention back to the basic level of analysis focussing on individuals making choices in concrete social, political, moral, environmental and economic circumstances. This attention to the social setting of economic activity gives us a precise focus and at the same time allows for consideration of a broad range of topics including (for example) religion, ethics, environment, youth, ageing, family, income and power distribution in relation to race, class and geography, education, individual consumer behaviour, health, diet, environment, crime and violence.

From this, it follows that the meaning and range of social economics has to reflect the different, changing, emerging and evolving nature of economic activity in a social context: this covers both the type of issue considered and the way in which issues are understood and conceptualised. It follows from this that the IJSE will not only continue to publish work within social economics but that it should also publish philosophical and reflective papers on what social economics itself is.