"GENERAL EQUILIBRIUM AS KNOWLEDGE. FROM WALRAS ONWARDS" Groupe de Recherches Epistemologiques et Socio-Economiques et Pole d'Histoire et d'Analyse des Representations Economiques (GRESE-PHARE, Universite Paris 1) Centre d'etudes interdisciplinaire Walras-Pareto (CWP, Universite de Lausanne) Centre Alexandre Koyre en Histoire des Sciences et des Techniques (EHESS) Call for Papers General Equilibrium as Knowledge. From Walras Onwards. International Conference Paris, 6-8 September 2007 Honorary Committee Maurice Allais, Anne P. Carter, John S. Chipman, Dale W. Jorgenson, Edmond Malinvaud, Herbert E. Scarf, Martin Shubik The aim of this conference is to gather contributions on general equilibrium, its spread and its uses since Walras. General equilibrium is considered here as ‘knowledge’, i.e. as a combination of theoretical references, technical standards and economic and social representations. The goal of the conference is not to provide yet another history of general equilibrium as a theoretical object. It is more about pointing out the interpretative contexts and the technical instruments that shaped, and still shape, the uses of general equilibrium within ‘theoretical and ‘applied’ economics as well as outside economics. The conference should be of interest to social scientists working in the history of economic thought, but also in the fields of applied economics, science studies, history of applied mathematics, sociology, social and political philosophy. Contributors might wish to adopt one of the following viewpoints. >From a first viewpoint, general equilibrium is of course a central reference to economic theory. However, its coherence and meaning are controversial topics. Be it the classical questions of existence, unity and stability or its properties in terms of welfare, the theoretical structure of general equilibrium and the analytical tools it is built with are very important in appraising the various meanings and uses of general equilibrium. >From this point of view, Walras’s and Pareto’s respective models can be usefully compared; the different types of axiomatic used should be examined and the connections with game theory cannot be avoided if one is to understand the logic of the construction and the different interpretations of general equilibrium. Central issues such as the various interpretations of tâtonnement, the historical spread of general equilibrium and its popularization, or the meaning and consequences of Sonnenschein, Mantel and Debreu results would be highly relevant to the Conference topic. In this perspective, to revisit once more the Socialist calculation debate and the links between welfare economics and general equilibrium theory would also be welcome. These questions should be tackled in such a way as to bring out the role of groups, institutions and national traditions, without however neglecting important contributors, such as Wald, von Neumann, Hicks, Samuelson, Allais, Arrow, to name but a few. >From a second viewpoint, general equilibrium is a reference in various fields of economic research. At the core of macroeconomic model building, general equilibrium is also central to various forms of decision making analyses such as input-output analysis, linear programming, national accounting, economic planning, and the whole spectrum of applied general equilibrium models. More precisely, general equilibrium is related to the social and technical systems in which it is developed. One can mention for instance the many developments of input-output techniques in relation to national accounting systems; or the many uses of general equilibrium since the Second World War, at the Cowles commission and within centrally planed systems. The scientific committee would appreciate contributions recounting the activity of such institutions and scientific networks. More recent developments such as computable general equilibrium would help understand better an apparently strictly instrumentalist use of general equilibrium theory. In the same vein, and outside economic theory, general equilibrium models are involved nowadays in fields such as the analysis of climatic change; this may help discover other kinds of uses of general equilibrium in decision-making and model building. >From a third viewpoint, general equilibrium opens up to many representations and concepts that either have been adopted by other disciplines (the analysis of social equilibria) or have been implemented through material and technical devices. All those devices can produce results the proprieties of which are taken as extremely useful. They can also be used in order to find out hidden properties of formal systems. Thus, contributions to the conference might identify how general equilibrium has been used in different types of technical or conceptual applications. For instance, during the 1930s and 1940s, concepts and tools borrowed from general equilibrium have been at the core of numerous social theories (/Harvard Pareto Circle/, plans of social reform). Similarly, concepts borrowed from general equilibrium models have been embodied in many technical devices. One may think of the Fisher machine, but also of electronic networks and computation systems used either in economic planning or in price fixing on the stock exchange. All those suggestions are not exclusive and are given here with the sole aim of being specific about the scope of the conference. Whatever the topic, contributions to the conference ought to establish connections between theoretical developments, interpretative debates and specific uses of general equilibrium models. Thus, general equilibrium will stand out as a contextualized knowledge. The scientific committee invites proposals for individual papers, as well as for entire sessions (3-4 speakers). The latter should include proposals and synopses for each paper in the session, although the committee reserves the right to determine which papers will be presented in the session if accepted. Should a session be rejected, the committee may incorporate one or more of the proposed papers into other panels. Submissions should be mailed to [log in to unmask] Each author should send his/her abstract (of at least 5000 signs) as an attached document (PDF or RTF format) to an electronic mail containing the title of the paper, his/her name, affiliation, postal and electronic addresses and the fax number. The deadline for submission is February 1st , 2007. A complete list of accepted contributions and a provisional programme would be available on March 15th , 2007. A final draft of the papers will be asked for the 31 August 2007. _Scientific Committee_: Michel Armatte (EHESS), Roberto Baranzini (Universite de Lausanne), Olav Bjerkholt (Universitetet i Oslo), Alban Bouvier (Universite Aix-Marseille), Pascal Bridel (Universite de Lausanne), Annie Cot (Universite Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne), Amy Dahan-Dalmedico (EHESS), Michel De Vroey (Universite catholique de Louvain), Arnaud Diemer (Universite d'Auvergne), Pierre Dockes (Universite Louis Lumière Lyon 2), Jean-Pierre Dupuy (Stanford University), François Etner (Universite Paris Dauphine), Francois Gardes (Universite Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne), Marion Gaspard (Universite Louis Lumière Lyon 2), Gaël Giraud (Universite Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne), D. Wade Hands (Puget Sound University), Giorgio Israel (Universita La Sapienza, Roma), Michael Jerison (University at Albany, State University of New-York), Jerome Lallement (Universite Rene Descartes Paris 5), Robert J. Leonard (UQAM), Jean-Sebastien Lenfant (Universite de la Reunion), Fabian Muniesa (Ecole des Mines de Paris), Katheline Schubert (Universite Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne), Donald Walker (University of Indiana), E. Roy Weintraub (Duke University) _Local organizing committee_: Amanar Akhabbar, Roberto Baranzini, Annie L. Cot, Marion Gaspard, Jerome Lallement, Jean-Sebastien Lenfant, Fabian Muniesa, Jean-Baptiste Tun. Information on the conference can be found at http://ge2007.univ-paris1.fr <http://ge2007.univ-paris1.fr/>. For any additional information, please send your request to [log in to unmask] Jean-Sébastien Lenfant