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Robert Leeson said: 
 
> Let me rephrase: there exist between historians and historians of economic 
> thought barriers of language and training that do not exist in economics 
> departments.  In addition to producing high-quality historical scholarship, 
> historians of economic thought have a role to play in influencing the 
> direction of economic research and policy formation.  Given the 
> balkanisation of academic economic knowledge this function is unlikely to 
> be performed from 'outside' departments. 
 
Before responding specifically to your two statements here, let me say 
that my response reflects my own interests and background, and I am not 
implying that others need do the same. In fact, I think that many 
historians of economics are also economists (I still want to distinguish 
between them) and as economists would agree with you. 
 
My response: 
 
1. I was trained first as an historian, and only latterly as an economist. 
A fair portion of my training in economics was in economic history and the 
history of economics, and historiographic concerns dominated my training 
in both of these fields (I also did a field in economic methodology, but I 
received no training in econometrics). To date I am still far more 
comfortable reading the literature of North-American intellectual history 
than I am reading contemporary articles in economic theory. I read 
regularly now in the history of biology, sociology, political science, and 
philosophy, and also in science studies, cultural studies, and literary 
theory to supplement my research in history of economics. I say this not 
to suggest that everyone should be doing the same, but simply to point out 
that in some cases, the barriers of language and training are between 
historians of economics and economists, not between historians of 
economics and historians. Do not assume that all historians of economics 
were or are first and foremost economists. 
 
2. Because many historians of economics were trained primarily as 
economists, many of them do want to contribute to the direction of 
economic research and policy formation. I have tried in my responses 
simply to indicate that this is not a requirement of the historian of 
economics per se. 
 
Ross 
 
Ross B. Emmett                Editor, HES and CIRLA-L 
Augustana University College 
Camrose, Alberta CANADA   T4V 2R3 
voice: (403) 679-1517   fax: (403) 679-1129 
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URL: http://www.augustana.ab.ca/~emmer 
 
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