ECONOMICS HAS BECOME THE IMPERIAL SOCIAL SCIENCE. IT IS THE ONLY branch of social inquiry that enjoys a Nobel prize. It has been celebrated in a massive four-volume, 4-million word "dictionary," through which there runs, like an Ariadne's thread, the assumption that economics has finally escaped the parochial boundaries of its former kingdom of production and distribution, and can now lay claim to a realm that extends from family affairs to sports, from anthropology to political ...