A quantitative turn in the historiography of economics?

Abstract

Quantitative approaches are not yet common among historians and methodologists of economics, although they are in the study of science by librarians, information scientists, sociologists, historians, and even economists. The main purpose of this essay is to reflect methodologically on the historiography of economics: is it witnessing a quantitative turn? Is such a turn desirable? We answer the first question by pointing out a ‘methodological moment’, in general, and a noticeable rise of quantitative studies among historians of economics during the past few years. To the second question, all contributors to this special issue bring relatively optimistic answers by highlighting the benefits of using quantitative methodologies as complements to the more traditional meta-analyses of both historians and methodologists of economics.