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Announcement of New European Association for Evolutionary Political  
Economy (EAEPE) Research Area 
 
Institutional History of Economics 
 
Research Area Coordinator: Esther-Mirjam Sent (Erasmus University 
Rotterdam, the Netherlands & University of Notre Dame, USA), Department 
of Economics, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN 46556, USA, 
Phone: +1-219-631-6979, Fax: +1-219-631-8809, E-mail: [log in to unmask] 
 
According to orthodox history of economics, the criteria by which 
economic knowledge claims are to be judged are universal and 
ahistorical, and the conclusions of economics are determined by the 
economic world rather than by the social world. Recently, this view has 
come under attack for being beset by grave difficulties. In particular, 
it has been argued that the empirical conclusions of economics must be 
seen as interpretative constructions, dependent for their meaning upon 
and limited by the cultural resources available to a particular social 
group at a particular point in time. Similarly, criteria for assessing 
economic knowledge claims are always open to varied interpretations and 
are given meaning in terms of particular economists' specific 
intellectual commitments, presuppositions, and objectives.  
 
Whereas evolutionary political economy offers an alternative approach 
to the examination of economic agents, institutional history of 
economics supplies a different perspective on the evaluation of 
economists. Moreover, it employs the concept of "institutions" to 
capture the linkages, networks, and processes in which these economists 
operate. Whereas evolutionary political economy provides an alternative 
to neoclassical economic theory, therefore, institutional history of 
economics furnishes an alternative to orthodox history of economics. 
Following EAEPE's theoretical perspectives, it does so in the following 
terms: 
 
The approach to analysis is based on an evaluation of relevant 
tendencies and linkages in actual economics - instead of a methodology 
that sanctifies fictions and diverts attention from the difficult task 
of analyzing the practice and culture of economics. 
 
The analysis is open-ended and interdisciplinary in that it draws upon 
relevant material in psychology, anthropology, politics, and history - 
instead of a definition of history of economics in terms of a rigid 
method that is applied indiscriminately to a wide variety of economic 
approaches. 
 
The conception of economics is of a cumulative and evolutionary process 
unfolding in historical time in which economists are faced with chronic 
information problems and radical uncertainty about the future - instead 
of approaches to theorizing that focus exclusively on the product of 
this process. 
 
The concern is to address and encompass the interactive, social process 
through which economics is formed and changed - instead of a 
theoretical framework that takes economists and their interests as 
given. 
 
It is appropriate to regard economics itself as a social institution, 
necessarily supported by a network of other social institutions - 
instead of an orientation that takes economics itself as an ideal or 
natural order and as a mere aggregation of individual economists. 
 
It is evaluated how the socio-economic system is embedded in a complex 
ecological and environmental system - instead of a widespread tendency 
to ignore ecological and environmental considerations or consequences 
in the history of economics. 
 
The inquiry seeks to contribute not only to history of economics but 
also to economics - instead of an orthodox outlook that ignores the 
possibility of such cross-fertilization. 
 
Therefore, an institutional history of economics research area fits 
very well in the EAEPE theoretical perspectives. Furthermore, such a 
focused historical outlook had been wrongly missing from EAEPE's  
scientific development plan. 
 
The first activities of the research area include organizing a workshop 
in April 1999 at Erasmus University Rotterdam and sessions in November 
1999 at the EAEPE conference. Stay posted for further details! 
 
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