I. INTRODUCTION
Beginning in the 1960s, subfields claimed a central place in the production and dissemination of economic knowledge. Generalists were replaced by economists who specialized in the study of international economics, public economics, labor economics, or econometrics. New infrastructure emerged, including field-specific societies and field-specific journals (Backhouse and Cherrier Reference Backhouse and Cherrier2017; Cherrier Reference Cherrier2017; Cherrier and Rebours Reference Cherrier and Rebours2023; Desmarais-Tremblay, Johnson, and Sturn Reference Desmarais-Tremblay, Johnson and Sturn2023; Desmarais-Tremblay and Svorenčik Reference Desmarais-Tremblay and Svorenčik2021; Svorenčik Reference Svorenčik2021). Some of the earliest movers were those interested in social choice and the political economy of governance. In 1963, a coalition of economists and political economists established the Committee for Non-Market Decision Making; a preliminary conference led to the creation of the Public Choice Society, an annual conference, and a specialized journal, Public Choice (Buchanan Reference Buchanan2003; Medema Reference Medema2011).Footnote 1 Public Choice was quickly followed by the Journal of Human Resources (1965), the Journal of Economic Education (1969), the Journal of International Economics (1971), the Journal of Public Economics (1972), the Journal of Econometrics (1973), the Journal of Urban Economics (1974), the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management (1974), and the Journal of Comparative Economics (1977), all attached to newly formed societies and associations.
Historians of economics and of economic thought similarly recognized the benefits of a dedicated space in which to pursue their work (Coats Reference Coats1969, Reference Coats1971; Goodwin Reference Goodwin1998).Footnote 2 Although the teaching of the history of economic ideas was in decline, crowded out by increased emphasis on mathematical and statistical technique, publications in the subject area had increased by a third over the previous decade (Coats Reference Coats1969, p. 12).Footnote 3 Craufurd Goodwin wrote that he talked often with Joseph J. Spengler and Robert S. Smith in the late 1960s “about the decline of interest [in the history of economic thought] we perceived throughout the scholarly community, and after a while, we determined to resist the trend by the creation of a society—and perhaps a journal” (Reference Goodwin1998, p. 6).
Similar efforts were under way in the UK; there, scholars hosted the first annual history of economic thought conference at the University of Sussex in spring of 1968. Two Americans were in attendance: Goodwin and William J. Barber. While the conference became an annual event, to the surprise of co-organizer Donald Winch, all was not a success (Winch Reference Winch2010). The idea to establish a specialized journal in the history of economic ideas foundered when Lionel Robbins “strongly opposed a specialist journal on the grounds that this would isolate historians from the profession and make it easier for general journals to reject manuscripts. Indeed, he would advise his ‘former pupils’ to have nothing whatsoever to do with the project!” (Goodwin Reference Goodwin1998, p. 6; see also Winch Reference Winch2010).
By this time, however, Goodwin was well under way to launching the History of Political Economy (HOPE). With funding secured from the National Science Foundation, the Ford Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation, Goodwin hosted a conference at Duke University for the papers that would comprise the initial issue (Goodwin Reference Goodwin1998, p. 6).Footnote 4 The first article in the first issue was an essay by A. W. (Bob) Coats that outlined research priorities in the history of economic ideas. As a “field,” the history of economic ideas “occupied an uncomfortable position in the academic spectrum, in the interstices between the vigorously expanding and rapidly changing discipline of economics and economic history, and its present position exhibits both ambivalent and contradictory features” (Coats Reference Coats1969, p. 9). Coats complained of “histories of economics for economists” and called instead for historical investigations that would place subjects within historical and intellectual contexts. In addition, he argued that the field would benefit from greater attention to “applied economics, the evolution of data, techniques, and tools” (Coats Reference Coats1969, pp. 12–13). Provocative and prescient, the article has become the subject of the sort of “first rate,” “systematic” scholarship of intellectual history that Coats demanded (see Augello and Guidi Reference Augello and Marco2009; Dudenhefer Reference Dudenhefer2009; Medema Reference Medema2009). Coats followed the essay with an examination of the sociological importance of publishing for historians of economic thought in the production of economic knowledge and the concomitant success of academic careers (Coats Reference Coats1971).Footnote 5 Together, these pieces provided the contextual, intellectual, and theoretical underpinnings for the creation of the History of Economics Society (HES).Footnote 6
Encouraged by the initial response to the HOPE conference and volume, Goodwin, William Allen, Robert V. Eagly, William Grampp, Warren J. Samuels, and Vincent J. Tarascio (all members of the inaugural HOPE editorial board) began to plan for a society whose mission was:
(1) to promote interest and inquiry into the history of economics and related parts of intellectual history, in general. (2) Facilitate communication and discourse among scholars working in the field. (3) Acquaint members of the profession, particularly the young, with the scientific, literary, and philosophical tradition of economics today.
(V. Tarascio to Executive Committee, HES Records, 19 July 1973, Box 1, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Duke University; hereafter HESR)The HES was formally established in 1974, the culmination of seven years of planning that resulted in the society’s institutionalization with a constitution, annual conference, organized sessions at the American Economic Association, and a published bulletin.Footnote 7
II. THE PRELIMINARIES
The founding members of the HES outlined their early efforts in a National Endowment for the Humanities funding request (W. J. Samuels to W. Emerson, 8 March 1972, Box 1, HESR).Footnote 8 In only four years, HOPE had achieved a subscribership of nearly 1,000 individuals and institutions and processed more than 300 submissions. Sessions organized on the topic of the history of economics at the American Economic Association meetings had a reported attendance of
upwards of 300 people, as many persons or more than most sessions on other specialized topics. The papers which have been delivered at these sessions reflect the new excitement which is beginning to pervade our field. At the last AEA meeting, we took tentative steps to establish an informal society for the History of Economics.
(W. J. Samuels to W. Emerson, 8 March 1972, Box 1, HESR)Scholarship in the history of economics was presented as a potential counterweight to the increased focus on technique across the social sciences; indeed, it was “one of the few live humanistic dimensions within the discipline” (W. J. Samuels to W. Emerson, 8 March 1972, Box 1, HESR). Reflecting Coats’s (Reference Coats1969) concern over the marginalization of the history of economic ideas, the HES founders argued that the appropriate place for study of the history of economics was “firmly within departments of economics rather than in departments of history” (W. J. Samuels to W. Emerson, 8 March 1972, Box 1, HESR).
In their funding application, the HES founders identified ten areas of research. The proposed research program encompassed the use of models in the history of economics, including the work by Thomas Kuhn and Robert K. Merton,Footnote 9 past and potential contributions from the related fields of psychology and sociology, the quantification of data in the history of economics, and the examination of the textbooks used for teaching the history of economics. Additionally, substantive work was necessary on the state of relevant archives; the use of biographical studies and the publication of personal papers, correspondence, and other related materials; the state of scholarship in major areas such as the classical school, the Physiocrats, and the Greeks; the techniques used to record and interpret recent economic thought, including the use of oral history; and the relationship between the history of economic thought and the history of philosophy (W. J. Samuels to W. Emerson, 8 March 1972, Box 1, HESR).Footnote 10
One important question remained: a name for the society. Grampp did not take an initial stand but commented that “I received your memo on HES (is that supposed to be a concession to Female Lib by combining ‘his’ and ‘her’?)” (W. Grampp to V. Tarascio, 13 June 1972, Box 1, HESR). Goodwin voted, “I like Society for the History of Economics (SHE) better than HES. Apart from women’s lib, it avoids the large adjectival clause which I find awkward” (C. Goodwin to V. Tarascio, 20 June 1972, Box 1, HESR). The topic was formally taken up by the society’s founders at the subsequent meeting: “Item (1): A suggestion that the name be, ‘Society for the History of Economics,’ rather than the one mentioned. There seems to be some strong support for the name in the original memorandum, i.e., History of Economics Society, mainly to avoid the questionable acronym SHE” (V. Tarascio to W. Allen, R. Eagly, C. Goodwin, W. Grampp, and W. J. Samuels, 6 July 1972, Box 1, HESR).
III. AN EXPLORATORY CONFERENCE
An exploratory conference on the theme “The History of Economics: State of the Art” was organized for May 30–31, 1973, at the Sheraton Chicago Hotel. The conference was initially budgeted at $5,000, and the planners anticipated that “this relatively small expenditure could have major impact on an important field of humanistic studies” (W. J. Samuels to W. Emerson, 8 March 1972, Box 1, HESR). While seeking papers at a level of generality that would be of interest to a wide number of participants, Goodwin felt “we should allow people to prepare and present papers only if they will take on the type of challenging topic I have listed [e.g., the ten areas of research]” (C. Goodwin to W. J. Samuels, 29 February 1972, Box 1, HESR).
Five sessions were planned on the topics of methods in intellectual history, history of economic thought of major areas, the problem of value, history of thought of specialized fields, and a roundtable on the teaching of the history of economics. In addition to the conference planners, speakers included Harry Johnson, Ronald L. Meek, Henry Spiegel, and George Stigler (Table 1). The best papers were published in a special issue of HOPE (1974).Footnote 11 In the introduction to the issue, Samuels reported that “about seventy persons attended … the newly formed History of Economics Society” conference (1974, p. 243).Footnote 12
Table 1. The Program for the 1973 Exploratory Conference
* An incomplete pencil note indicates Spengler was replaced by “yall Brandis” (sic). Likely, the replacement was Royall Brandis, who was an early HES member and president (1979–1980).
Immediately following the conference, Tarascio wrote to the executive committee, confirming the decision in Chicago to have an annual meeting in May of each year, beginning in May 1974. It was proposed to hold two executive committee meetings annually, one at the American Economic Association meetings in December and one at the HES conference. The letter also included significant logistical planning for conference chairs, scheduling, and the selection and terms of officers and committee members (V. Tarascio to Executive Committee, 11 June 1973, Box 1, HESR).
The preliminary conference was followed in December 1973 with the first official joint session sponsored by the HES and the American Economic Association. Planned by Eagly, the topic was “Perspectives on Twentieth Century Economic Theory.” The session featured Spengler on the golden age in the history of economics and John R. Hicks, who had received the Nobel Prize in Economics the previous October. Hicks’s topic was “Capital Controversy: Ancient and Modern”; discussants were Carl G. Uhr and Robert W. Clower. Eagly declared, “I believe that this session, which marks the premiere participation of the History of Economics Society in the annual December reunion, is an admirably fine send-off for our newly-founded society” (R. Eagly to V. Tarascio, 13 May 1973, Box 1, HESR).
IV. THE FIRST HES CONFERENCE
The first official HES conference was held at the University of North Carolina May 29–31, 1974. It was hosted by Tarascio, the first president of the society (V. Tarascio to Executive Committee, HES, 19 July 1973, Box 1, HESR). The conference opened with a business meeting of the society, which included ratification of the society’s constitution, drafted the previous year.Footnote 13 Stigler gave a plenary talk over dinner on “Economists and Policy.” Papers covered a diversity of topics. Studies of individuals examined Henry George, Karl Marx, Thorstein Veblen, and James Mill. Additional topics included the use and structure of economic models, American economic thought, and methodological and philosophical approaches to the history of economics (see Table 2; the original conference program, including discussants, can be found on the History of Economics Society website).Footnote 14 Unfortunately, the list of attendees does not seem to have been preserved.
Table 2. Program for the 1974 Conference
The roundtable on source materials illustrates the early emphasis placed on the identification and preservation of primary source materials by the HES founders (W. J. Samuels to W. Emerson, 8 March 1972, Box 1, HESR) and by early society officers such as James Cochrane (secretary/treasurer). Goodwin proved a pivotal figure in the creation of American archives, most notably via his contributions to the founding of the Economists’ Papers Archive at Duke University.Footnote 15 Kenneth E. Carpenter was a Harvard polymath librarian, an expert on eighteenth-century political economy, and a long-time HES member (Carpenter Reference Carpenter1977; Giraud Reference Giraud2004). Another participant was R. D. Collison Black, an Irish economist at Trinity College Dublin. Black is perhaps best remembered for his “tool making,” the compiling of detailed catalogs, bibliographies, and editions on topics and scholars important to economic thought. In addition to his Papers and Correspondence of William Stanley Jevons (Black 1972–Reference Black, by and Konekamp1981), he had helped to organize the funds to employ an archivist to compile the Economists’ Papers, 1750–1950: A Guide to Archive Sources for the History of British and Irish Economic Thought, which was published by Duke University Press (Sturges Reference Sturges1975; see also Winch Reference Winch2010).Footnote 16
V. STABILIZATION
While HOPE had provided significant support for the HES in the earliest years of the society, a conscious decision was made for the journal and the society to proceed as separate entities.Footnote 17 Goodwin explained that “during the early years we maintained a cooperative relationship with the History of Economics Society, offering discounted subscription rates to members and collecting membership dues. As the society grew and started its own journal, we parted as friends” (Goodwin Reference Goodwin1998, p. 8). This choice represented an early example of the long-standing tradition of “friendly collegiality” that continues to characterize HES meetings (Samuels Reference Samuels2005, p. 395).
In 1975, the annual HES conference was held at the Kress Library of Business and Economics at Harvard University, known for its enviable collection of fifteenth- to nineteenth-century economics manuscripts, pamphlets, and broadsides (Rogers Reference Rogers1986).Footnote 18 The conference expanded to ten sessions, along with a dinner roundtable on “The Economist in Presidential Decision Making: From Truman to Johnson,” which included Royall Brandis (chair), Barber, Cochrane, Goodwin, Scott Gordon, and R. Stanley Herren. The conference also hosted the first HES Presidential Address; the session was chaired by Stigler, and Tarascio spoke on “Pareto: A View of the Present Through the Past.”Footnote 19 Attendance expanded to eighty-one individuals (eleven women). New attendees included Robert Ekelund, Frank Fetter, Israel M. Kirzner, Ingrid Rima, and Donald Winch.
On July 8, 1975, the HES was formally incorporated in the state of South Carolina. Signatories included Cochrane, then the secretary and treasurer, President Spengler, and Vice-president Uhr. Over its half-century, the HES has benefitted from forty-seven presidents, including nearly all the individuals discussed herein. Thirteen individuals have served as secretaries and/or treasurers. In 1990, the society’s bulletin was transformed into what is now one of the most highly ranked journals in the field. In 2000, Warren J. and Sylvia J. Samuels endowed the society with funds to support a young scholars program, dedicated to growing the history of economic thought by providing funds for conference attendance for early-career scholars. They have since funded more than 200 individuals, many of whom have become officers of the HES. In 2005, the HES underwent its first major revision of the constitution, when the society separated the positions of treasurer and secretary due to the increased workload associated with each position. In 2015, the society underwent a second revision, to increase the tenure of presidents and vice-presidents, in an effort to conserve more institutional memory.
