Narrative in Economics: A New Turn on the Past

Abstract

Narratives have drawn increasing attention from economists and from historians and philosophers of science. Yet little of that attention has made it into the history of economics itself. This essay reviews some of the salient literature on economic narratives and introduces key themes from a 2021 workshop intended to bring that analysis to bear within the history of economics. Four important, but little noticed, functions of narratives emerging from that workshop are highlighted: exploration, explanation, closure, and reopening; and promising areas for future research on the multiple roles of narrative in the history of economic practice are suggested.