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[Note from the moderator: This message was posted yesterday, but never 
made it to the list. I'm reposting it and apologize for possible multiple 
postings. --E-MS] 
 
Roy, 
 
First, as I said before, I agree with your standard for contributions 
to the intellectual history of economics. But the field of history of 
economic thought can also represent part of the "extended present" as 
Boulding wrote about in HOPE way back when.  In other words, 
individuals can employ history of thought to explore dead ends.  That 
is how I read Horwitz's paper ... an attempt to link up two 
literatures that have existed side by side, but never really met eye 
to eye.  The monetary disequilibrium school of the pre-Keynesian 
monetarists (as now represented in the work of Yeager) with the 
Austrian theory of the trade cycle.  In this case, Horwitz is a 
consumer of history of economic thought and using what he has 
"purchased" in another endeavor -- which is exploring a path not 
taken when the path taken led to a dead end. 
 
What I don't understand is why you are so willing to dismiss out of 
hand contributions of this type and to insist that only intellectual 
history should be accepted within our field.  Certainly you are 
correct that work of an intellectual history type should be held up 
as the exemplars in our field, but even in a field that respects 
intellectual history -- such as political theory -- intellectual 
history can be employed as a method of contemporary theory 
construction.  See, e.g., the work of Alsasdir MacIntyre.  Cannot 
economics follow a similar model? 
 
Why has history of thought become the field for this type of work? 
Because what unites us is a passion for understanding the continuity 
and discontinuity within the conversation that represents the 
discipline of economics.  Since we share this passion and concern 
with understanding, what has shaped that conversation and how has it 
evolved? Why seek to exclude?  Some scholars are going to do original 
work _in_ the intellectual history of economics, others are going to 
employ that work, and some are going to misuse it.  Just like in any 
field of scholarship.  Of course, we want high standards.  I 
suggested before that those standards should be (for original work) the 
standards that exist in the field of intellectual history in general, 
just as the standards for methodology should be those established in 
that literature, _and_ the standards for history of thought as 
contemporary theory should be those reflected in the work of scholars 
such as Jacob Viner (in his Studies in International Trade).  But 
note, we wouldn't want to exclude Jacob Viner from the club simply 
because in that work he is not doing work like Q. Skinner, though we 
recognize that Q. Skinner is the one really doing intellectual 
history to the standard we hope to aspire.  Viner is doing theory, 
but in a manner that is different from that which modern methods and 
prejudices allow, and in a manner which historians of thought can 
learn from. 
 
It seems to me we would be an impoverished field if we insisted on 
only one or the other model for our society.  The Cottrell/Horwitz 
exchange I think is a poor example, for Cottrell's criticisms (whether 
valid or not) were not on your point, but instead on the idea that 
Horwitz was sneaking in a theoretical and ideological agenda that Cottrell 
opposes and that he has criticized in published articles (which Horwitz did 
not take into account in his paper).  Horwitz can defend his paper 
himself, but what he did was link two literatures that alone run 
into problems, but together might avoid them.  It was an exercise in 
non-Whig rational reconstruction (if you allow me that terminology). 
It is a work of synthesis, which might have contemporary relevance. 
Why is this not a contribution to "Historical perspectives on modern 
economics"?  It is _not_ a contribution to understanding the 
intellectual history of Clark Warburton's theory of cummulative rot, 
but it doesn't pretend to be. 
 
I am just not sold on the idea that (1) everyone confuses the 
differences between an original contribution to the intellectual 
history of economics, and the deployment of history of thought in 
contemporary theory construction; and (2) that we should be excluding 
scholars from the community who deploy h.o.t., rather than produce 
it.  Isn't our field wide and robust enough to sustain both types of 
work -- and recognize that different standards apply? 
 
Pete 
 
Peter J. Boettke 
Assistant Professor of Economics 
Department of Economics 
New York University 
269 Mercer Street 
New York, NY 10003 
phone: (212) 998-8900 
fax: (212) 995-4186 
email: [log in to unmask] 
alternative email: [log in to unmask] 
web: http://www.econ.nyu.edu/user/boettke 
 
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