IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hec/heccee/2012-9.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Of Positivism and the History of Economic Thought

Author

Listed:
  • Bruce Caldwell

Abstract

The rhetoric of positivism had a profound effect on the worldview and practice of economists in the middle of the last century. Though this influence has greatly diminished, it still may be found in the attitude of many economists towards the history of their discipline. This paper traces the effects of positivism in economics, then argues that the history of economics is a critical component of both the undergraduate teaching and the graduate training of economists, and that as such, it should be reintroduced into the economics curriculum. It concludes by documenting some recent hopeful signs of change.

Suggested Citation

  • Bruce Caldwell, 2012. "Of Positivism and the History of Economic Thought," Center for the History of Political Economy Working Paper Series 2012-09, Center for the History of Political Economy.
    • Handle: RePEc:hec:heccee:2012-9
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hope.econ.duke.edu/node/656
    File Function: main text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Keywords

    positivism; history of economic thought; history of economics; economic methodology; undergraduate education; graduate education; Hayek;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • A11 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Role of Economics; Role of Economists
    • A12 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Relation of Economics to Other Disciplines
    • A22 - General Economics and Teaching - - Economic Education and Teaching of Economics - - - Undergraduate
    • A23 - General Economics and Teaching - - Economic Education and Teaching of Economics - - - Graduate
    • B0 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - General
    • B1 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought through 1925
    • B2 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought since 1925
    • B3 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought: Individuals
    • B4 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - Economic Methodology

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hec:heccee:2012-9. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Center for the History of Political Economy Webmaster (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://hope.econ.duke.edu .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.