Prof. Erik Reinert: “80 Economic Bestsellers before 1850: A Fresh Look at the History of Economic Thought”, Episode 3

Guest: Professor Erik Reinert, Tallinn University of Technology, Estonia & the Other Canon Foundation. Hosted and produced by Maria Bach This episode is a recording of a webinar organised by The YSI INET History of Economic Thought, Economic Development, Economic History and Latin America Working Groups – special thanks to Daniel Munevar whose voice you hear at the beginning. In this webinar, Professor Erik Reinert presents his paper on the "80 Economic Bestsellers before 1850: A Fresh Look at the History of Economic Thought". ABSTRACT: The paper studies the economics books which – judged by the number of editions – were the most influential between 1500 and 1849, and compares these to what is represented in accounts of the history of economic thought today. The most interesting outcome of this work is that if we assume some degree of correlation between the influence of a text and the number of editions published, the publication history we present here suggests that some authors who were once influential are now being neglected. Furthermore, the presentation tracks core ideas of development economics and industrial policies to texts of the XVII and XVIII centuries. Link to a blog post about the paper: https://developingeconomics.org/2017/06/01/80-economic-bestsellers-before-1850-a-fresh-look-at-the-history-of-economic-thought/ Link to paper: https://developingeconomics.files.wordpress.com/2017/06/reinert-et-al-80-economic-bestsellers-before-1850-3.pdf Slides: Download [132.62 KB]