The authors introduce the historical epistemology of economics as a broad historical approach for exploring the production of economic knowledge in particular historical settings. Instead of following the evolution of economic theories, historical epistemology addresses the practices economists rely on, the tools they work with, the material settings they work in, and the kinds of professional identities they adopt. Structured around the three themes of historicity, practices, and persons, the Element's sections illustrate this approach through a set of short, closely researched studies and commentaries. The authors demonstrate how historical epistemology discloses new ways of telling the history of economics, going beyond economists' own stories about their discipline. Historical epistemology emerges as a multifaceted and critical perspective that highlights contingency, practice, and lived experience. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
The authors introduce the historical epistemology of economics as a broad historical approach for exploring the production of economic knowledge in particular historical settings. Instead of following the evolution of economic theories, historical epistemology addresses the practices economists rely on, the tools they work with, the material settings they work in, and the kinds of professional identities they adopt. Structured around the three themes of historicity, practices, and persons, the Element's sections illustrate this approach through a set of short, closely researched studies and commentaries. The authors demonstrate how historical epistemology discloses new ways of telling the history of economics, going beyond economists' own stories about their discipline. Historical epistemology emerges as a multifaceted and critical perspective that highlights contingency, practice, and lived experience. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
Managing Growth in Miniature explores the history of the way economists think about growth. It focuses on the period between the 1930s and 1960s, tracing the development of the famed 'Solow growth model,' one of the central mathematical models in postwar economics. It argues that models are not simply 'efficient tools' providing answers to the problems of economic theory and governance. The Solow model's various uses and interpretations related not only to the ways it made things (in)visible, excluded questions, and suggested actions. Its 'success' and effects ultimately also pertained to its fundamental ambiguities. Attending to the concrete sides of economic abstractions, this book provides a richly layered and accessible account of the forms of knowledge that shaped the predominant notion of 'economic growth' and ideas of how to govern it.