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Cliometrics

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New economic history or sometimes called cliometrics[1], or econometric history [2] is a quantitative approach to economic history[3], it refers to the systematic application of economic theory, econometric techniques, and other formal or mathematical methods to the study of history (especially, social and economic history). The term cliometrics refers to Clio, who was the muse of history and according to the economist Claudia Goldin was originally coined by mathematical economist Stanley Reiter in 1960.[4]

Clio by Pierre Mignard, oil on canvas, 1689
Clio—detail from The Allegory of Painting by Johannes Vermeer

History of discipline

The New economic history originated in 1958 with the work of Alfred Conrad and John R. Meyer with the publication of "The Economics of Slavery in the Ante-Bellum South," in the Journal of Political Economy.[3] The New economic history revolution actually began in the mid-1960s and was resisted because many incumbent economic historians were either historians or economists who had very little connection to economic modelling or statistical techniques.[5] The first projects published during the revolution are well known among economists.[citation needed] Much of the research was conducted by people who went on to distinguished careers in academia, including two who became Nobel Laureates. One key area of interest was transportation history.[6] Another was slavery.[3] Still others focused on agriculture and farming.[citation needed] Cliometrics began to gain a following and become better known when Douglass North and William Parker became the editors of the Journal of Economic History in 1960. The Cliometrics Meetings began to be held around this time at Purdue University and are still held annually in different locations. Today, cliometrics can be followed in the major journals, especially the Journal of Economic History and Explorations in Economic History.

According to economist Claudia Goldin, the success of the cliometric revolution had as an unintended consequence the disappearance of economic historians from history departments. As economic historians started using the same tools as economists, they started to seem more like other economists. In Goldin's words, "the new economic historians extinguished the other side".[7] The other side nearly disappeared altogether, with only a few remaining in history departments and business schools. However, some new economic historians did, in fact, begin research around this time, among them were Kemmerer and Larry Neal (a student of Albert Fishlow, a leader of the cliometric revolution) from Illinois, Paul Uselding from Johns Hopkins, Jeremy Atack from Indiana, and Thomas Ulen from Stanford.[citation needed] In spite of this, the separation of economic history and economics continued until the 1970s.[citation needed]

Thus became the problem of cliometrics. The dilemma was voiced by Donald McCloskey in 1976. He disagreed with the current position which was created by the new method of formalizing economic theory and testing that economic theorists no longer needed to be learned in economic history.

A group to encourage and further the study of cliometrics, The Cliometric Society, was founded in 1983.

In 1993, Robert Fogel and Douglass North were awarded the Bank of Sweden Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics partly for their work in establishing cliometrics, in particular "for having renewed research in economic history by applying economic theory and quantitative methods in order to explain economic and institutional change".[8]

Purpose

Cliometricians argue their approach is necessary because the inclusion of history is necessary in formulating solid economic theory.[citation needed] First, they say, it is risky to base conclusions on “transient phenomena.”[citation needed] Empiricists have learned over time that historical data are useful because they provide larger samples and more clearly show trends.[citation needed] Finally, knowledge from the past helps us see what is possible today.

Nobel Prize in Economics

In October 1993, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel to Robert William Fogel and Douglass Cecil North "for having renewed research in economic history." The Academy noted that "they were pioneers in the branch of economic history that has been called the 'new economic history,' or cliometrics."[9] Fogel and North both focused on changes in the price of transportation in their research.

Robert W. Fogel and Douglass North won the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel for turning the theoretical and statistical tools of modern economics on the historical past: on subjects ranging from slavery and railroads to ocean shipping and property rights.

North was born in Cambridge in 1920.[10] As an undergraduate at the University of California at Berkeley in the early 1940s, he considered himself a Marxist. Wartime service in the merchant marine and nine months as a dust bowl photographic chronicler of California farm life for the government persuaded him to become an economist. He formulated his views during 15 years as a professor at the University of Washington in Seattle, before moving to Washington University in St. Louis in 1982.

Fogel was born in New York City in 1926. He earned his doctorate under Simon Kuznets at Johns Hopkins University in 1963, and taught at the University of Chicago until 1975, when he moved to Harvard. He returned to the University of Chicago in 1981, where he remains director of the Center for Population economics.

Fogel is often described as the father of modern econometric history.[9] He's especially noted for using careful empirical work to overturn conventional wisdom. North, a professor at Washington University in St. Louis, was honored as a pioneer in the "new" institutional history. In the Nobel announcement[9], specific mention was made of a 1968 paper on ocean shipping, in which North showed that organizational changes played a greater role in increasing productivity than did technical change.[11]

Fogel is identified with two issues in particular. There was a 1964 book[6] arguing that the spread of the railroad was not as important to the opening of the American West as had been argued by Joseph Schumpeter and Walt Rostow. Using "counterfactual" arguments (supposing that things had happened differently than they did, and examining what the consequences would have been) and a great deal of benefit-cost analysis, Fogel argued in his book that canals would have done the job about as well;[12] the "iron horse" probably contributed no more than 3 percent to the growth of gross domestic product, he calculated.

In a second, far more controversial book, Time on the Cross: The Economics of American Negro Slavery, cowritten by Stanley Engerman and published in 1974, Fogel argued that the institution of slavery had been more profitable than previously thought.[13] He was attacked as somehow endorsing slavery.[citation needed] Fogel later published a four-volume study called "Without Consent or Contract,"[14] in which he argued forcefully that slavery ended not because it was economically inefficient, but because it was morally repugnant.

Cliodynamics

Main article: Cliodynamics

Cliodynamics is a new multidisciplinary area of research focused at mathematical modeling of historical dynamics. It investigates dynamic processes in history, and is led by Peter Turchin and Andrey Korotayev. The term was originally coined by Peter Turchin in 2003.[15]

Cliometrica

In 2006, a new journal Cliometrica - Journal of Historical Economics and Econometric History (Springer Verlag) was created to provide a leading forum for exchange of ideas and research in all facets, in all historical periods and in all geographical locations of historical economics. The journal encourages the methodological debate, the use of economic theory in general and model building in particular, the reliance upon quantification to buttress the models with historical data, the use of the more standard historical knowledge to broaden the understanding and suggesting new avenues of research, and the use of statistical theory and econometrics to combine models with data in a single consistent explanation Cliometrica.

References

  1. ^ Fogel, Robert (1966). "The New Economic History. Its Hindings and Methods". Economic History Society. Retrieved 5 May 2010. The 'new economic history', sometiems called economic history or cliometrics, is not often practiced in Europe. However, it is fair to say that efforts to apply statistical and mathematical models currently occupy the centre of the stage in American economic history. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
  2. ^ Woodman, Harold (1972). "Economic History and Economic Theory: The New Economic History in America". The Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the editors of The Journal of Interdisciplinary History. Retrieved 5 May 2010. Among the most recent of the changes in emphasis-today's new history-is the rise of the "new economic history" or, as it is variously called, econometric history or cliometric.
  3. ^ a b c Edward L. Glaeser, "Remembering the Father of Transportation Economics", The New York Times (Economix), October 27, 2009.
  4. ^ Goldin, Claudia (1995). "Cliometrics and the Nobel". The Journal of Economic Perspectives. 9 (2): 191. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
  5. ^ Claudia Goldin, "Cliometrics and the Nobel", The Journal of Economic Perspectives, Vol. 9, No. 2 (Spring, 1995), p. 194.
  6. ^ a b Fogel R. Railroads and American Economic Growth: Essays in Econometric History, 1964, The Johns Hopkins University Press; 1St Edition (December 1, 1964), ISBN 0801802016.
  7. ^ Claudia Goldin, "Cliometrics and the Nobel", The Journal of Economic Perspectives, Vol. 9, No. 2 (Spring, 1995), p. 206.
  8. ^ The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, Prize announcement, 1993, retrieved on 2009-11-07.
  9. ^ a b c The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 1993, Press Release, October 12, 2003.
  10. ^ Douglass C. North. (2009). In Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved November 07, 2009, from Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
  11. ^ North, Douglass C. (1968). "Sources of Productivity Change in Ocean Shipping, 1600-1850." Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 76 (September-October), pp. 953-70.
  12. ^ Claudia Goldin, "Cliometrics and the Nobel", The Journal of Economic Perspectives, Vol. 9, No. 2 (Spring, 1995), p. 197.
  13. ^ Fogel, Robert William and Engerman, Stanley L. Time on the Cross: The Economics of American Negro Slavery. Reissue edition. New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 1995. ISBN 0393312186
  14. ^ Robert W. Fogel, Without Consent or Contract: The Rise and Fall of American Slavery, W W Norton & Co Inc; 1st edition (October 1989), ISBN 0393018873.
  15. ^ *History & Mathematics: Historical Dynamics and Development of Complex Societies. Edited by Peter Turchin, Leonid Grinin, Andrey Korotayev, and Victor C. de Munck. Moscow: KomKniga, 2006. ISBN 5484010020

Bibliography

  • Fogel R. Railroads and American Economic Growth: Essays in Econometric History, 1964.
  • Fogel, Robert William and Engerman, Stanley L. Time on the Cross: The Economics of American Negro Slavery. Reissue edition. New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 1995. ISBN 0393312186
  • Lyons, John S., Louis P. Cain and Samuel H. Williamson, eds. Reflections on the Cliometrics Revolution: Conversations with Economic Historians (Routledge, 2008), 506pp; ISBN 978-0-415-70091-7; reprinted interviews from the Newsletter of the Cliometric Society
  • North, Douglas, The State of Economic History (bibliography), American Economic Review, 55 (May 1965)
  • North, Douglas and Thomas, Robert, The rise of the Western world: a new economic history, Cambridge University Press, 1973

See also

Associations


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