Textbooks in the Historiography of Recent Economics

Abstract

Textbooks are both neglected and at times overused as objects in the history of economics. They are neglected because most historians, borrowing from Kuhn, tend to regard them as passive receptacles of past knowledge, yet they are also overused as shortcuts to study the state of economic doctrine at a certain point in time. Looking at the existing historical literature that studies or uses textbooks, this chapter shows how a better understanding of the specific pedagogical and institutional environments in which textbooks operate can help build thicker and more accurate histories of the role they have played, not just in disseminating, but also in creating and transforming economic knowledge.

Keywords: Textbooks, Historiography of Recent Economics, History of Science, Economics Education

JEL Classification: B20, A20, Z10