The Struggle Over the Soul of Economics : Institutionalist and Neoclassical Economists in America Between the Wars

This is an excellent book that should be read by professional economists, and others interested in the history of the discipline. It provides a history of the confrontation between neoclassical and institutional economics between the wars. It illuminates many puzzles. Central is that of the ideas that dominated post-war Western (especially Anglo-Saxon) policy making. That is, until economists came through who could do the maths (rather than things like Edgeworth boxes) who ran the show? Why were people like Wesley C. Mitchell, Arthur Burns and others, who played dominant roles in US conomic policy-making, so very different in approach and attitude to what followed once Samuelson and others had effected the mathematical revolution. The crucial point made is that both institutionalists and the necoclassicals they fought were swept away by the post-war mathematicisation of economics. In this sense, neo-institutionalists are no more modern-day institutionalists than neo-classicals are modern classical economists. The failed institionalist attempt to create a basis for economics that would start from a fresh examination of the massive amounts of data that was coming available sits beside the gathering evidence that modern econometrics, co-integration and all, in effect does little more. Thus the massive tensions remain, for example between the exogenous preferences assumptions that penetrate economics as taught, and the need to address such issues as the data presents them. A great book. Adam Fforde This book provides a surprising answer to two puzzling questions that relate to the very "soul" of the professional study of economics in the late twentieth century. How did the discipline of economics come to be dominated by an approach that is heavily dependent on mathematically derived models? And what happened to other approaches to the discipline that were considered to be scientifically viable less than fifty years ago? Between the two world wars there were two well-accepted schools of thought in economics: the "neoclassical," which emerged in the last third of the nineteenth century, and the "institutionalist," which started with the works of Veblen and Commons at the end of the same century. Although the contributions of the institutionalists are nearly forgotten now, Yuval Yonay shows that their legacy lingers in the study and practice of economics today. By reconsidering their impact and by analyzing the conflicts that arose between neoclassicists and institutionalists, Yonay brings to life a hidden chapter in the history of economics. The author is a sociologist of science who brings a unique perspective to economic history. By utilizing the actor-network approach of Bruno Latour and Michel Callon, he arrives at a deeper understanding of the nature of the changes that took place in the practice of economics. His analysis also illuminates a broader set of issues concerning the nature of scientific practice and the forces behind changes in scientific knowledge. "This book provides a surprising answer to two puzzling questions that relate to the very "soul" of the professional study of economics in the late twentieth century: How did the discipline of economics come to be dominated by an approach that is heavily dependent on mathematically derived models, and what happened to other approaches to the discipline that were considered to be scientifically viable less than fifty years ago? Between the two world wars there were two well-accepted schools of thought in economics: the "neoclassical," which emerged in the last third of the nineteenth century, and the "institutionalist," which started with the works of Veblen and Commons at the end of the same century. Although the contributions of the institutionalists are nearly forgotten now, Yuval Yonay shows that their legacy lingers in the study and practice of economics today. By reconsidering their impact and by analyzing the conflicts that arose between neoclassicists and institutionalists, Yonay brings to life a hidden chapter in the history of economics. His analysis also illuminates a broader set of issues concerning the nature of scientific practice and the forces behind changes in scientific knowledge."--Jacket 000_FrontMatter......Page 1 001_Chapter 1......Page 15 002_Chapter 2......Page 43 003_Chapter 3......Page 63 004_Chapter 4......Page 91 005_Chapter 5......Page 114 006_Chapter 6......Page 129 007_Chapter 7......Page 150 008_Chapter 8......Page 177 009_Chapter 9......Page 198 010_Chapter 10......Page 210 011_BackMatter......Page 237 Includes bibliographical references (p. [251]-278) and index.Electronic reproduction.Boulder, Colo. :netLibrary,2003.Available via World Wide Web.Digital version of: The struggle over the soul of economics : institutionalist and neoclassical economists in America between the wars. Yuval P. Yonay. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [251]-278) And Index.