Metalanguage for conceptual diversity in economics: Edgeworth box reconsidered

The article proposes a concrete example of developing a positive intradisciplinary discourse, based on a new perspective on the Edgeworth box model within the context of a discussion about the prospects of higher economic education in Russia, which unfolded, among other places, on the pages of the journal Voprosy Ekonomiki. By relaxing the explicit and implicit assumptions of zero transaction costs and the availability of structural alternatives for organizing economic exchanges, the paper demonstrates how conceptual diversity within economic science can manifest in relation to a specific model. It further shows how, in this context, critical thinking skills — as understood in the context of economic education — could be engaged both by established researchers and students for the development of a model of positive intradisciplinary discourse. The exposition is built on the idea of a specific form of metalanguage for intradisciplinary discourse, a function performed by neoclassical economic theory as it is presented in university microeconomics courses.