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on History and Philosophy of Economics |
| By: | Olivier J. Blanchard |
| Abstract: | This year marks the 40th anniversary of the NBER Macro Annual Conference, founded in 1986. This paper reviews the evolution of mainstream macroeconomics since then. It presents my views, informed by a survey of a number of researchers who have made important contributions to the field. I develop two main arguments. The first is that, starting from strikingly different positions, there has been substantial convergence, in terms of methodology, architecture, and main mechanisms. Methodology: Explicit micro foundations, explicit treatment of distortions, with, at the same time, an increased willingness to deviate from rational expectations, neoclassical utility and profit maximization. Architecture: The wide acceptance of nominal rigidities as an essential distortion, although with mixed feelings. Mechanisms: The wide nature of the shocks to both the demand and the supply side. The second is that this convergence has been, for the most part, good convergence, i.e. the creation of a generally accepted conceptual and analytical structure, a core to which additional distortions can be added, allowing for discussions and integration of new ideas and evidence, rather than fights about basic methodology. Not everything is right however, with too much emphasis on general equilibrium implications from the start, rather than, first, on partial equilibrium analysis of the phenomenon at hand. The appendix to the paper gives a sample of the views of the members of the survey on each of these arguments. |
| JEL: | E0 E10 E20 E30 |
| Date: | 2025–05 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:33802 |
| By: | Engelbert Stockhammer |
| Abstract: | Comparative Political Economy (CPE) is a field in the social sciences that explores the interaction of economic dynamics and political institutions in a comparative cross-country fashion. Recently, the growth models approach (GMA), which builds on post-Keynesian economics (PKE), has challenged the more supply-side oriented varieties of capitalism approach. This paper gives an overview of the debate around GMA, with a focus on macroeconomic issues. It first, discusses the fragmentation of the 19th century political economy approach into heterodox economics and the subsequent formation of CPE and International Political Economy in the social sciences. Second, it clarifies the relations between VoC, GMA and PKE. Third, it reviews debates on identifying growth models empirically; the interpretations of finance-led growth; and the application of GMA to emerging economies, which requires extending and possible reconsidering the analytical framework of GMA. It concludes by discussing similarities and differences between the growth models approach and the French Regulation Theory and Social Structures of Accumulation. It argues that GMA’s analytical framework has been shaped by the experience of the pre-GFC boom and current debates are about building a more general analytical framework. |
| Keywords: | Post-Keynesian Economics, Comparative Political Economy, growth models, economic growth |
| JEL: | B20 B50 E12 O43 P51 |
| Date: | 2025–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pke:wpaper:pkwp2515 |
| By: | Richard N. Langlois (University of Connecticut) |
| Abstract: | This paper will revisit the intersection of Chandler with Williamson (and the NIE more generally) and attempt to draw lessons from it. I will argue that despite their similar influences, from both the Carnegie School and more generally from the varied currents of post-war managerialism, Chandler and Williamson modeled the corporation quite differently. On the one hand, their disagreement had what I view as a salutary effect the economics of organization by lending the imprimatur of Chandler to the capabilities approach. On the other hand, Chandler’s rejection of the NIE also arguably threw out the Coasean baby with the Williamsonian – or, more precisely, the asset-specificity – bathwater. I attempt to outline a path for post-Chandlerian business history that retains the lessons of Weber and the Carnegie School while adding the lessons of Coase. |
| Keywords: | Alfred Chandler, Oliver Williamson, Ronald Coase, transaction costs, capabilities, diversification, asset specificity |
| JEL: | B15 B25 B31 L21 L22 L25 |
| Date: | 2025–07 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uct:uconnp:2025-07 |
| By: | Gregori Galofre-Vila (Universitat de Valencia); Victor M. Gomez-Blanco (CUNEF Universidad) |
| Abstract: | This paper presents a network-based bibliometric analysis of economic history, focusing on the field’s intellectual structure, institutional dynamics, and evolving research themes and methodologies. Using data from the five leading journals in the field—The Journal of Economic History, Explorations in Economic History, Economic History Review, European Review of Economic History, and Cliometrica—we map collaboration and citation networks from 2000 to 2024. The findings highlight the continued dominance of Anglo-American and Western European institutions, with emerging contributions from Spain, Italy, and the Netherlands. We also document interdisciplinary ties to economics, finance, demography, and other social sciences, and the enduring influence of seminal scholars alongside a rising generation of researchers. Finally, we identify a clear methodological shift from largely descriptive quantitative analyses to more sophisticated techniques, particularly panel data models and quasi-experimental designs. This study contributes to a deeper understanding of economic history’s evolution, highlighting both its intellectual richness and persistent institutional imbalances. |
| Keywords: | Economic history, Cliometrics, Bibliometric analysis, Network analysis |
| Date: | 2025–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bci:wpaper:2501 |
| By: | Hedtke, Reinhold |
| Abstract: | My argument is that social science subject didactics cannot succeed in constructing a singular, sufficiently distinct identity solely through its identification with a single scientific discipline as its reference discipline. Rather, economic and political education can only be meaningfully designed if it is conceived jointly and separately within the overall framework of the social sciences as a field of study and learning and in relation to a model of a social science educated personality. |
| Keywords: | Wirtschaftsdidaktik, Politikdidaktik, Didaktik der Sozialwissenschaften, Ökonomische Bildung |
| JEL: | A20 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:esprep:319932 |
| By: | James K. Galbraith; Ravi Kanbur; Kunal Sen; Andy Sumner |
| Abstract: | Seven decades ago, Simon Kuznets put forward the hypothesis that as economies developed, national inequality would first increase and then decrease—an inverted U-shape. He provided preliminary evidence for the hypothesis on the basis of the limited data available at the time, and theorized the genesis of the curve as arising from the twin forces of structural transformation of the economy and political economy pressures. |
| Keywords: | Kuznets, Inequality, Structural transformation, Political economy |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2025-46 |