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In response to Shira Lewin: 
 
Thank you for your posting of last week. I find little to disagree 
with in what you say or, perhaps, should say that I would welcome 
a colleague who sees the discipline in the way that you do. I still 
am a little uneasy with your idea that all/most history of thought should 
be focused on contemporary issues in economic theory, but I would like 
to imagine that we're only a healthy distance apart on this issue. 
I would very much like, for instance, to see  more courses (graduate 
and undergraduate) on themes like "Monetarism, 1960-1985" or "The 
Economics of Poverty, 1880-1980"; I believe that looking at the 
developments (and dead ends, reversals, lost threads, quixotic efforts) 
in specific areas such as these (with consideration of the social 
and political history) would be a great boon to the discipline. We 
could help students to see how questions get framed, how theory 
develops (doesn't develop), how theory does and doesn't get used, 
how people and politics shape what happens. Understanding economics and the 
work of economists in fuller context might even help to slow the widely 
discussed fall-off in economics enrollments. I won't go on... 
 
Thanks, again, for your posting. I hope that when you're tenured 
and secure you will speak out thoughtfully in your department for 
a strong role for the history of thought in the curriculum of the 
department. 
 
Brad Bateman 
Grinnell College 
 
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