Economic history

Economic history
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Economic history is the study of economies or economic phenomena in the past. Analysis in economic history is
undertaken using a combination of historical methods, statistical methods, and by applying economic theory to
historical situations and institutions. The topic includes business history, financial history and overlaps with areas of
social history such as demographic history and labor history. Quantitative (econometric) economic history is also
referred to as Cliometrics.[1]

Development as a separate field

Treating economic history as a discrete academic discipline has been a contentious issue for many years. Academics
at the London School of Economics and the University of Cambridge had numerous disputes over the separation of
economics and economic history in the interwar era. Cambridge economists believed that pure economics involved a
component of economic history and that the two were inseparably entangled. Those at the LSE believed that
economic history warranted its own courses, research agenda and academic chair separated from mainstream
economics.
In the initial period of the subject's development, the LSE position of separating economic history from economics
won out. Many universities in the UK developed independent programmes in economic history rooted in the LSE
model. Indeed, the Economic History Society had its inauguration at LSE in 1926 and the University of Cambridge
eventually established its own economic history programme. However, the past twenty years have witnessed the
widespread closure of these separate programmes in the UK and the integration of the discipline into either history or
economics departments. Only the LSE and the University of Glasgow retain separate economic history departments
and stand-alone undergraduate and graduate programmes in economic history. The LSE, Glasgow and the University
of Oxford together train the vast majority of economic historians coming through the British higher education
system.
In the US, economic history has for a long time been regarded as a form of applied economics. As a consequence,
there are no specialist economic history graduate programs at any mainstream university anywhere in the country.
Instead economic history is taught as a special field component of regular economics PhD programs in some places,
including at University of California, Berkeley, Harvard University, Northwestern University and Yale University.
In recent decades economic historians, following Douglass North, have tended to move away from narrowly
quantitative studies toward institutional, social, and cultural history affecting the evolution of economies.[2][3]
However, this trend has been criticized, most forcefully by Francesco Boldizzoni, as a form of economic imperialism
"extending the neoclassical explanatory model to the realm of social relations."[4] Conversely, economists in other

Economic history

specializations have started to write on topics concerning economic history.[5]

History of capitalism
Since 2000 the new field of "History of Capitalism" has appeared, with courses in history departments. It includes
topics such as insurance, banking and regulation, the political dimension, and the impact on the middle classes, the
poor and women and minorities.[6]

Relationship between economics and economic history

Have a very healthy respect for the study of economic history, because that's the raw material out of which any of your conjectures
or testings will come.
- Paul Samuelson (2009)

[]

Yale University economist Irving Fisher wrote in 1933 on the relationship between economics and economic history
in his "Debt-Deflation Theory of Great Depressions" (Econometrica, Vol. 1, No. 4: 337338): 'The study of
dis-equilibrium may proceed in either of two ways. We may take as our unit for study an actual historical case of
great dis-equilibrium, such as, say, the panic of 1873; or we may take as our unit for study any constituent tendency,
such as, say, deflation, and discover its general laws, relations to, and combinations with, other tendencies. The
former study revolves around events, or facts; the latter, around tendencies. The former is primarily economic
history; the latter is primarily economic science. Both sorts of studies are proper and important. Each helps the other.
The panic of 1873 can only be understood in light of the various tendencies involveddeflation and other; and
deflation can only be understood in the light of various historical manifestations1873 and other."
There is a school of thought among economic historians that splits economic historythe study of how economic
phenomena evolved in the pastfrom historical economicstesting the generality of economic theory using
historical episodes. US economic historian Charles P. Kindleberger explained this position in his 1990 book
Historical Economics: Art or Science?.[7] One of the professional societies for economic historians in Europe is also
called the European Historical Economics Society to reflect this emphasis.
The new economic history, also known as cliometrics, refers to the systematic use of economic theory and/or
econometric techniques to the study of economic history. The term cliometrics was originally coined by Jonathan R.
T. Hughes and Stanley Reiter in 1960 and refers to Clio, who was the muse of history and heroic poetry in Greek
mythology. Cliometricians argue their approach is necessary because the application of theory is crucial in writing
solid economic history, while historians generally oppose this view warning against the risk of generating
anachronisms. Early cliometrics was a type of counterfactual history. However, counterfactualism is no longer its
distinctive feature. Some have argued that cliometrics had its heyday in the 1960s and 1970s and that it is now
neglected by economists and historians.[8]

Nobel Prize winning economic historians

Milton Friedman won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1976 for "his achievements in the fields
of consumption analysis, monetary history and theory and for his demonstration of the complexity of stabilization
policy".
Robert Fogel and Douglass North won the Nobel in 1993 for "having renewed research in economic history by
applying economic theory and quantitative methods in order to explain economic and institutional change".
Merton Miller, who started his academic career teaching economic history at the LSE, won the Nobel in 1990
with Harry Markowitz and William Sharpe.

Economic history

Notable economic historians

Moses Abramovitz
T. S. Ashton
Dudley Baines
Correlli Barnett
Jrg Baten
Maxine Berg
Ben Bernanke
Michael Bordo
Fernand Braudel
Stephen Broadberry
Rondo Cameron
Sydney Checkland
Carlo M. Cipolla
Gregory Clark
Thomas C. Cochran
Dora Costa

Nicholas Crafts
Louis Cullen
Peter Davies
Brad DeLong
Mauricio Drelichman
Barry Eichengreen
Stanley Engerman
Andreas Exenberger
Charles Feinstein
Niall Ferguson
Marc Flandreau

Ronald Findlay
Roderick Floud
Robert Fogel
Milton Friedman
Claudia Goldin
John Habakkuk
Earl J. Hamilton
Eli Heckscher
Philip T. Hoffman
Eric Hobsbawm
Leo Huberman
Harold James
Ibn Khaldun
Charles P. Kindleberger
John Komlos
Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie

David Landes
Tim Leunig
Peter Lindert

Economic history

Friedrich List
Robert Sabatino Lopez
Angus Maddison
Karl Marx
Peter Mathias
Ellen McArthur
Deirdre McCloskey
Joel Mokyr

Larry Neal
Douglass North
Cormac Grda
Kevin H. O'Rourke
Henri Pirenne
Karl Polanyi
Erik S. Reinert
Christina Romer
Jean-Laurent Rosenthal

W. W. Rostow
Murray Rothbard
Ram Sharan Sharma
Adam Smith
Anna Jacobson Schwartz
Robert Skidelsky
Graeme Snooks
R. H. Tawney
Peter Temin
Adam Tooze
Hans-Joachim Voth
Jan de Vries
Eberhard Wchtler
Eugene White
Jeffrey Williamson
Tony Wrigley
Larry Schweikart
Lennart Schn
Christer Gunnarsson

Economic history

Notes
[1] Robert Whaples (2008). "Cliometrics" in S. Durlauf and L. Blume, eds. The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics, 2nd ed. Abstract (http:/ /
www. dictionaryofeconomics. com/ article?id=pde2008_C000173& edition=current& q=Economic history& topicid=& result_number=7).
[2] Douglass C. North (1965). "The State of Economic History," American Economic Review, 55(1/2), pp. 86 (http:/ / www. jstor. org/ pss/
1816246)-91.

_____ (1994)."Economic Performance through Time," American Economic Review, 84(3), p p. 359 (http:/ / www. jstor. org/ pss/
2118057)-368. Also published as Nobel Prize Lecture. (http:/ / nobelprize. org/ nobel_prizes/ economics/ laureates/ 1993/ north-lecture.
html)
[3] For example:
Gregory Clark (2006), A Farewell to Alms: A Brief Economic History of the World, Description (http:/ / press. princeton. edu/ titles/ 8461.
html), contents (http:/ / press. princeton. edu/ TOCs/ c8461. html), ch. 1 link (http:/ / press. princeton. edu/ chapters/ s8461. pdf), and Google
preview (http:/ / books. google. com/ books?hl=en& lr=& id=i-PLg2PsNd4C& oi=fnd& pg=PT1& dq=+ Long-run+ equilibrium&
ots=fF5GxnCIYm& sig=3ZpUcXAStipXCCAcIZvOwFh7aCM#v=onepage& q& f=false).
E. Aerts and H. Van der Wee, 2002. "Economic History," International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences pp. 4102-410.
Abstract (http:/ / www. sciencedirect. com/ science/ article/ pii/ B0080430767026401).
[4] Francesco Boldizzoni (2011), The Poverty of Clio: Resurrecting Economic History. Princeton: Princeton University Press, p. 18 (http:/ /
press. princeton. edu/ titles/ 9476. html)
[5] For example: Carmen M. Reinhart and Kenneth S. Rogoff (2009), This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly. Princeton.
Description (http:/ / press. princeton. edu/ titles/ 8973. html), ch. 1 ("Varieties of Crises and their Dates," pp. 3-20) (http:/ / press. princeton.
edu/ chapters/ s8973. pdf), and chapter-preview links. (http:/ / books. google. com/ books?id=ak5fLB24ircC& printsec=frontcover&
source=find& pg=PR7gbs_atb#v=onepage& q& f=false)
[6] See Jennifer Schuessler "In History Departments, Its Up With Capitalism" New York Times April 6, 2013 (http:/ / www. nytimes. com/ 2013/
04/ 07/ education/ in-history-departments-its-up-with-capitalism. html?_r=0)
[7] Charles P. Kindleberger (1990), Historical Economics: Art or Science? (http:/ / www. escholarship. org/ editions/
view?docId=ft287004zv;brand=ucpress), University of California Press, Berkeley
[8] Robert Whaples, "Is Economic History a Neglected Field of Study?", Historically Speaking (April 2010) v. 11 #2 pp 1720, with responses
pp 2027

References
Further reading
Bairoch, Paul (1995). Economics and World History: Myths and Paradoxes. Chicago: University of Chicago
Press. ISBN0226034631.
Barker, T. C. (1977). "The Beginnings of the Economic History Society". Economic History Review 30 (1): 119.
JSTOR 2595495 (http://www.jstor.org/stable/2595495).
Baten, Jrg; Muschallik, Julia (2012). "The Global Status of Economic History". Economic History of Developing
Regions 27 (1): 93113. doi: 10.1080/20780389.2012.682390 (http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/20780389.2012.
682390).
Boldizzoni, Francesco (2011). The Poverty of Clio: Resurrecting Economic History. Princeton University Press.
ISBN9780691144009. Attacks how rational-choice theory has been used; proposes renewing the field using
Continental traditions.
Cameron, Rondo; Neal, Larry (2003). A Concise Economic History of the World: From Paleolithic Times to the
Present (4th ed.). New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN0195127056.
Cipolla, C. M. (1991). Between History and Economics: An Introduction to Economic History. Oxford:
Blackwell. ISBN0631166815.
Costa, Dora; Demeulemeester, Jean-Luc; Diebolt, Claude (2007). "What is Cliometrica?". Cliometrica 1 (1):
16. doi: 10.1007/s11698-006-0001-1 (http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11698-006-0001-1).
Crafts, N.F.R. (1987). "Economic history", The New Palgrave: A Dictionary of Economics, v. 2, pp.3742.
Field, Alexander J. (2008). "Economic history", The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics. Abstract. (http://
www.dictionaryofeconomics.com/article?id=pde2008_E000016&q=history&topicid=&result_number=2)

Economic history
Gras, N. S. B. (1927). "The Rise and Development of Economic History". Economic History Review 1 (1): 1234.
JSTOR 2590668 (http://www.jstor.org/stable/2590668).
Mokyr, Joel, ed. (2003), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Economic History. Oxford, U.K.: Oxford University Press,
5 vols. Description. (http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/Economics/History/?view=usa&
ci=9780195105070)
Roy, Tirthankar (2002). "Economic History and Modern India: Redefining the Link". Journal of Economic
Perspectives 16 (3): 109130. JSTOR 3216953 (http://www.jstor.org/stable/3216953).
Whaples, Robert (2010). "Is Economic History a Neglected Field of Study?". Historically Speaking 11 (2):
1720, with responses pp.2027. doi: 10.1353/hsp.0.0109 (http://dx.doi.org/10.1353/hsp.0.0109).

External links
Journals
(http://www.springer.com/economics/economic+theory/journal/11698''Cliometrica'':) Issue & article links
(http://www.springerlink.com/content/120412/), v. 1, 2007
Economic History Review: (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1468-0289/homepage/
ProductInformation.html) Issue & article first-page links (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/
(ISSN)1468-0289/issues), v. 1927
Explorations in Economic History: (http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/
622830/description#description) Issue & article, v. 7, 1969
Journal of Economic History (http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayJournal?jid=JEH): Issue &
article-abstract links (http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayBackIssues?jid=JEH), v. 1, 1971

Professional societies
Economic History Society (UK) (http://www.ehs.org.uk/), publisher of the Economic History Review
Economic History Association (US) (http://www.eh.net/EHA/), publisher of the Journal of Economic History
The European Association for Banking and Financial History e. V. (http://www.eabh.info), publisher of the
Financial History Review
International Economic History Association (IEHA) (http://www.uni-tuebingen.de/ieha/)

Historical statistics
Groningen Growth and Development Centre Total Economy Database (http://www.ggdc.net/)Series on
GDP, Population, Employment, Hours worked, GDP per capita and productivity (per person and per hour) from
1950 up to 2006
Global Finance data series (http://www.eh.net/databases/finance/)
Historicalstatistics.org (http://www.historicalstatistics.org)Links to historical economic statistics for different
countries and regions.
Maddison (2006), The World Economy, OECD, Paris. (http://www.oecdbookshop.org/oecd/display.
asp?K=5L9ZBQKL5RLW&lang=EN)

Economic history

Recent and forthcoming economic history conferences

Economic History Society Annual Conference 2010 (http://www.ehs.org.uk/society/annualconferences.asp)
Economic History Association Meetings 2010 (http://articlescache.org/ehameeting.com/ehameeting.com.
htm.htm)
XV World Economic History Congress 2009 (http://www.wehc2009.org/)
XVI World Economic History Congress 2012 (http://www.wehc2012.org/)
Eighth Conference of the European Historical Economics Association (http://graduateinstitute.ch/
history-politics/page3559.html)

Economic History Services

EH.Net (http://eh.net/) Economic History ServicesIncludes Economic History Encyclopedia, Ask the
Professor, Book Reviews, databases, directories, bibliographies, mailing lists, and an inflation calculator.
EH.Net Encyclopedia (http://eh.net/encyclopedia):

Australia (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/attard.australia)
Hawaii (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/lacroix.hawaii.history)
Hong Kong (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/schenk.HongKong)
Indonesia (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/touwen.indonesia)

Israel (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/halevi.israel)
Japan (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/mosk.japan.final)
Korea (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/cha.korea)
Malaysia (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/drabble.malaysia)
New Zealand (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/Singleton.NZ)
Norway (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/grytten.norway)
Portugal (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/amaral.portugal)
Sweden (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/schon.sweden)
Taiwan (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/olds.taiwan.economic.history)
Uruguay (http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/Bertola.Uruguay.final)
EHE - An Economic History of Europe (http://www.econ.ku.dk/europe/Default.asp)For students of
economic history, includes links to major databases, technology descriptions, examples of use of data, a forum for
economic historians.

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