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Greg Ransom wrote: 
 
> Conversation (and "intellection" generally) is aided by examples. 
> It might help to clarify matters if an article or two (or a book or 
> two) in the history of economic thought were picked out at random, 
> and then discussed in terms of its virtues and defects as a contribution 
> to the history of economic thought, e.g. an article or two out of 
> HOPE or The European J. of the H. of Econ. Thought. 
 
>  What are the cases that inform the abstractions? 
 
Ok, Greg, I'll "bite". Consider the current (Fall 1996) JHET paper by 
Horwitz, comment by Cottrell, and Horwitz's reply to Cottrell. 
Consider Cottrell's remarks, say on page 309: "Considered as an 
exercise in the history of economic thought, the paper is lacking 
....Basically the paper is a piece of advocacy for (an augmented 
version of) Hayek's cycle theory." Horwitz replies that "In the 
sense that I was trying to set out an Austrian perspective on 
macroeconomic theory, it would be fair to call the paper a piece of 
`advocacy'... [But] I would hope that there is a place in economics 
for attempting to push forward particular approaches from, as it 
were, the inside." 
 
This, need I remark, appears in the "official journal" of the History of 
Economics Society. The exchange takes up 31 pages. I present 
Horwitz's paper as an exemplar of work 
that has been, and in the terms of my "Editorial" and Henderson's 
"Editorial", may be a contribution to (neo)Austrian economics, but is 
no contribution whatsoever to the history of economics. What 
editorial policy encourages such appearances in the JHET? Inquiring 
minds want to know. 
 
Is this specific enough, Greg? 
 
E. Roy Weintraub, Professor of Economics 
Director, Center for Social and Historical Studies of Science 
Duke University, Box 90097 
Durham, North Carolina 27708-0097 
 
Phone and voicemail: (919) 660-1838 
Fax: (919) 684-8974 
E-mail: [log in to unmask] 
URL: http://www.econ.duke.edu/~erw/erw.homepage.html 
 
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