On Some Aspects of Arena’s Interpretation of Sraffa

Sraffa was an author who was always at the centre of Arena’s research; in this chapter we attempt to assess Arena’s scholarship on Sraffa, by reviewing the relevant articles that he published over 50 years. We identify a number of themes that have been at the centre of his reflection over the years, highlighting how the opening of the Sraffa’s archives has both reinforced some convictions already present in his early writings and suggested some of his most original and interesting interpretations. Among the former, belief that Production of Commodities by Means of Commodities does not offer an alternative theory of prices in competitive markets to the neoclassical one, since the convergence of market prices to Sraffa's prices—the so-called ‘gravitation’—rests on assumptions that are too restrictive or ad hoc. The idea that Sraffa and Keynes are not reconcilable also persists in Arena’s works, albeit with substantial changes and developments. The opening of Sraffa’s archives opens new perspectives for Arena, prompting him to focus on a more radical aspect of Sraffa’s critique of marginalist theory: that of the critique of determinism and the notion of mechanical causality that is implicit in the use of the marginal method which surreptitiously introduces the concept of time and change. Our reconstruction reveals the eclectic character of Arena’s reflection on Sraffa, which cannot be classified in any sense as neo-Ricardian or post-Keynesian, but as an approach which maintains an open dialogue with both.