Uncertainty, insecurity, individual relative autonomy and the emancipatory potential of Galbraithian economics

J. K. Galbraith’s economics may be ‘foundational’ to integrating Original Institutionalism and Post Keynesianism (Dunn, S. P. 2011. The Economics of John Kenneth Galbraith, Cambridge, UK, Cambridge University Press). This paper seeks a stronger justification of the emancipatory potential of structural interventionism favoured by the above approaches, by interpreting Galbraith’s ‘emancipation of belief’ as implying a self-trusting capacity, applying the argument to Galbraith’s theory of social balance and advocating a supporting notion of individual psychological balance. John Davis’s capabilities characterisation of ideal human psychological development is built upon, incorporating insecurity under uncertainty. Carl Rogers’ humanistic psychology is used to understand how actual and ideal psychological development diverge. Since Rogers’ work lacks institutional context but shares with Veblenian Evolutionary Economics an organismic view of the individual, a ‘middle range’ conception of the psychologically developing institutionalised individual emerges. A counterpart to a Galbraithian ‘organisational’ view of capitalisms, this ‘organismic’ conception explains how ‘social balance’ maintenance (i.e. structural intervention) may be necessary for psychologically balanced self-trusting individuals.