In response to questions and uncertainty swirling in today’s economic climate, The University of Tulsa’s new Center for Heterodox Economics (CHE) is encouraging dialogue, offering fresh insight, and rethinking conventional frameworks on a local and global scale.
“Heterodox economics is at once a critique of dominant economic frameworks and also a proposal of alternative views,” said Clara Mattei, center director and professor of economics. “There’s the orthodoxy, and then there’s the heterodoxy, which is not just criticizing, it’s also trying to build something positive and instruct alternative ways of understanding and policy issues.”
Mattei received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in philosophy from Cambridge and the University of Pavia before receiving her doctorate in economics. Since then, she has taught at The New School for Social Research in New York and has served as a fellow for the Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton.
Joining UTulsa’s Kendall College for Arts & Sciences last fall, her research explores the history of capitalism and the critical relationship between economic ideas and technocratic policy making.
Mattei encourages students to embrace other theories through heterodox economics. “It was at The New School for Social Research that I realized I could have the courage to pursue what I was already doing, critiquing economics through historical methods,” she said. “I hope these young scholars who come to the center and connect with other scholars realize that there’s a community that can support their career without having them just conform to the models.”
The first step was CHE’s 2025 inaugural conference – titled “What’s Up with Capitalism?” – which was held in early February in UTulsa’s 101 Archer facility downtown. The event, held over the course of three days, invited members of the public to engage with leading scholars, organizers, and students from around the globe, explore alternative economic theory and practice, and learn how it affects their day-to-day lives.
The standing-room-only conference was driven by three themes: critical history of economic thought, critical political economy, and practice.
“The Center for Heterodox Economics is the first of its kind that endeavors to broaden the science of economics to include non-mainstream heterodox paradigms,” said Department of Economics Chair Scott Carter. “It is important to understand that economics is a social science, and accordingly must be viewed in a pluralistic manner, something that is especially and obviously relevant in today’s very uncertain world.”
Organizers plan to hold the conference annually together with a monthly speaker series that engages scholars with organizers on the ground. Events are open to the public at 101 Archer. The first speaker series is scheduled for March 7 and features economist Richard Wolff and Cooperation Jackson Director Kali Akuno on the topic “Beyond exploitation: Workers’ self-management for a new era.”
The center also plans to hold summer classes to offer students two weeks of full immersion, along with an internal curriculum. “We want to grow to be like the Chicago School of Economics – the ‘Tulsa School of Economics,’” Mattei said.