Fleetwood on causal holism: Clarification and critique

Fleetwood (2002, Cambridge Journal of Economics, vol. 26, no. 1, 27-45), provided a critical evaluation of causal holism (Boylan and O'Gorman, 1995, Ekonomia, vol. 1, no. 2, 9-21), from the perspective of critical realism. For Fleetwood there are three fundamental areas of disagreement, namely the differential approaches to unobservable entities, description, and explanation. In this paper the authors dispute Fleetwood's analysis of causal holism in all these areas. To contextualise and clarify their disagreements with Fleetwood, the authors examine the most significant differences between the two methodological frameworks. They argue that notwithstanding their shared criticism of mainstream economics, critical realism and causal holism remain methodologically incompatible.