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Published by EH.NET (December 2003) 
 
Warren J. Samuels, Jeff F. Biddle and John B. Davis, editors, _A Companion 
to the History of Economic Thought_. Oxford: Blackwell, 2003. xvii + 712 
pp. $134.95 (hardcover), ISBN: 0-631-22573-0. 
 
Reviewed for EH.NET by Mauro Boianovsky, Department of Economics, 
Universidade de Brasilia. 
 
The publication of this companion is a major event in the history of 
economic thought field. Warren Samuels, Jeff Biddle (both at Michigan State 
University) and John Davis (Marquette University, Wisconsin) have put 
together an impressive collection of thirty-nine essays covering the state 
of the art in the history of economic thought and historiography. The 
volume is divided into two parts -- "Historical Surveys" and 
"Historiography" -- plus an introductory chapter. The contributors are 
well-known experts in different aspects and periods of the history and 
methodology of economics. 
 
Twenty-eight surveys comprise Part I, arranged chronologically from ancient 
times until postwar economics. Chapters 2 to 11 provide surveys of 
traditional topics such as ancient Greek and medieval economics, 
mercantilism, physiocracy, political arithmetic, Adam Smith, classical 
economics, and Marx. Chapters 14 to 18 and 23 cover the German and English 
historical schools, American economic thought before 1900, English and 
Austrian marginalists, early general equilibrium analysis and interwar 
institutional economics. Macroeconomics is discussed in chapters 21, 22 and 
26, including pre-Keynesian business cycle theory, Keynes, and postwar 
monetary economics. Microeconomics is the theme of chapters 19, 20, 24 and 
25, on interwar imperfect competition theory, perfect competition and the 
neoclassical synthesis, and postwar general equilibrium and game theories. 
Chapter 28 is divided into five subchapters surveying several branches of 
postwar heterodox economics. Other chapters (12, 13 and 27) deal with 
topics such as non-Marxian socialism, utopian economics and the economic 
role of the government. Although most of the entries in Part I may be 
described as surveys of the literature, some are written as papers where 
authors develop new insights about certain episodes in history of economic 
thought (e.g. chapters 9, 21, 25 and 27 on homogeneity and race in 
post-Ricardian economics, "the stabilization of price theory" between 1920 
and 1955, "the formalist revolution" of the 1950s, and changes in the 
interpretation of the role of the government in the economy, respectively). 
 
The only other collection to date that can be compared to the _Companion_ 
in scope is the (1987) _New Palgrave: A Dictionary of Economics_, which 
included several entries on the history of economics. In the early 1990s a 
few thematic paperback volumes (on general equilibrium, capital theory, 
monetary economics, etc.) were made out of the entries in the _New 
Palgrave_, but there was no specific volume collecting the entries on 
history of thought. From that perspective, the _Companion_ fills a gap in 
the literature. Many of the entries in the _Companion_ refer to their 
matches in the _New Palgrave_ (e.g., chapters 7, 11 and 16 on Smith, the 
surplus interpretation of classical economics, and English marginalism, 
respectively) and/or provide updated references to the vast secondary 
literature that has come out since the late 1980s. Some chapters do neither 
(e.g. chapter 8 on classical economics). 
 
Although Part I of the _Companion_ provides a comprehensive treatment of 
the main topics in the history of economics, a few gaps may be noticed. The 
organization of the collection according to schools of thought and/or time 
period has several advantages, but also some drawbacks. Important topics 
such as trade theory, public finance and the theory of public goods, and 
econometrics are barely mentioned. Other examples are Wicksell's 
contribution to capital theory and Ramsey's model of optimal growth. 
Malthus's approach to effective demand is discussed in just one brief 
paragraph (pp. 123-24). Despite the positive reference to studies of 
"neglected" economists in the introductory chapter (p. 3), most of those 
economists continue to be neglected in this _Companion_ (e.g., J. Dupuit 
and H. Gossen on price theory, F. B. Hawley and N. Johanssen on saving and 
investment). 
 
Part II is formed mostly by new material, reflecting the intense debate 
that has taken place in the last few decades about historiographic matters 
in economic thought. Chapter 1 is a summing up of the main arguments of the 
second part of the _Companion_ (there is no similar introductory chapter 
for the first part, presumably because the historical surveys deal with 
more familiar material). Chapter 29 provides a useful overview of the main 
themes of modern historiography in general and in economics. The next 
chapter discusses in detail the contribution of the recent "science 
studies" approach to the history of economics. Chapters 31 to 33 provide a 
fascinating account of the several aspects of textual exegesis in HET, 
including an assessment of the use of mathematical modeling in the rational 
reconstruction of texts of the past. Developments in economic methodology 
after Kuhn are surveyed in chapter 34. Chapter 35 takes up the role of 
biography in HET, a topic that was the object of heated debate between G. 
Stigler and W. Jaffe in the 1960s. The next two chapters study some crucial 
features of the use and acceptance of economic ideas associated with the 
history of the formulation of economic policy and of the transmission of 
economic theories across international boundaries, respectively. Chapter 38 
claims that HET should be seen in the broad context of the history of ideas 
in general. The last chapter raises the important issue of the use of HET 
by both supporters and critics of orthodox economics. 
 
One interesting exercise is to do some cross-reading of the two parts of 
the _Companion_ in order to check in what extent the historiographic 
concerns discussed in part II are reflected in the historical surveys of 
the first part. It is worth noting, for instance, that although much 
attention is paid to the "constructivist" approach in the historiographic 
discussion, there are very few signs of its influence in the first part of 
the book, as witnessed by the relative lack of references to authors such 
as M. Foucault and P. Mirowski in the interpretations of physiocracy and of 
the marginalist revolution, respectively. In the same way, the reader would 
benefit from reading chapter 28 (on postwar heterodoxy) together with 
chapter 39, where the problems involved in the relation between HET and 
heterodoxy are taken up. 
 
Given the range and diversity of views of this _Companion_, it is 
representative of some of the best work that has been done in HET recently. 
As the editors inform the readers (p. xvi), there are plans to put together 
another _Companion_ dealing only with HET in the postwar period. One can 
hardly wait. 
 
Mauro Boianovsky is associate professor of economics at Universidade de 
Brasilia. His main field of research is the history of macroeconomics. 
Recent and forthcoming publications include "Patinkin, the Cowles 
Commission, and the Theory of Unemployment and Aggregate Supply," _European 
Journal of the History of Economic Thought_ (2002); "Wicksell, Cassel, and 
the Idea of Involuntary Unemployment" (with Hans-Michael Trautwein), 
_History of Political Economy_ (2003); "Some Cambridge Reactions to the 
General Theory: David Champernowne and Joan Robinson on Full Employment," 
_Cambridge Journal of Economics (forthcoming, 2004); and "The IS-LM Model 
and the Liquidity Trap Concept: From Hicks to Krugman," _History of 
Political Economy_ (2004). 
 
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Ross B. EmmettJames Madison CollegeMichigan State University317 South Case 
HallEast Lansing, MI 48825Phone: 517-432-6139Fax: 517-432-1804 
 
 
 
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