ABSTRACT
This elaboration starts by deciphering modern science as a social subsystem being loosely coupled to the rest of society. Additionally, the way in which modern (monistic) economics was generated within this subsystem during and after World War II will be sketched. This is contrasted with the view that this monism would have been eroded in recent times due to imports into economics from other sciences and that an orthodoxy would no longer exist. Conclusions as regards the necessity as well as the mode of pluralism are drawn from this discussion. Finally the basic features of a heterodox alternative are outlined.
