History and economics: Between Vagueness and the quest for precision
Image: L’arracheur de dents de Théodore Rombouts, peintre anversois.
(Methodos XII)
As noted above (note XX), history or more precisely historiographical disciplines (including history broadly construed, social history and economic history) are in a recurrent state of flux from the second half of the XIX century and the present day state of the discipline shows as much diversity and controversies as contemporaneous economic theory.[1] So, the task of comparing the two disciplines is arduous and implies a difficult choice. Relatively to history, I will focus on the common issues with economics worth of consideration. As a matter of a fact, the quest for precision is common to both disciplines and a hard version exist in each one: cliometrics or histoire sérielle, quantitative history; and traditional econometrics based on the central assumption of normality of socio-economic phenomena, e.g. economic outcomes (prices, profits, wages, etc.). The extreme version of quantification is subject to what I call the Pythagorean’s fallacy, i. e. that all things are numbers or could be reduced to numbers. If an object is imprecise, then it must lie behind the reach of science, a little like history for Augustin Cournot (Cournot 1851).
The problem of imprecision in human and socio-economic phenomena is central to the epistemological and methodological of the humanities, the social sciences, and economics in particular. This contrasts with the dominant tradition in economics (Lazear 2000).[2]
[1] See Gide, Charles and charles Rist (1922): Histoire des doctrines économiques. Paris: Sirey, Gide, Charles (1923): Cours d’économie politique, Vol I. Paris: Librairie Recueil Sirey .
[2] Burke, Peter (2000): A Social History of Knowledge. London: Polity
OpenEdition vous propose de citer ce billet de la manière suivante :
Marc Jacquinet (2 décembre 2019). History and economics: Between Vagueness and the quest for precision. Critique du management. Consulté le 10 mai 2026 à l’adresse https://doi.org/10.58079/ne20

