- Max Corden, University of Melbourne, Australia
`Francis Collins oversaw the human genome project. Mark Blaug and Peter Lloyd have done the same for economics, demonstrating that figures and diagrams are the DNA building blocks of the discipline. This book has them all: backward-bending labor supply, cobweb diagram, circular flow, production possibility frontier, Stolper-Samuelson box, IS/LM, the Phillips curve and many more. Each is portrayed, its importance explained, its origin revealed, and the reader often encounters Stigler's Law of Eponymy (No scientific discovery is named after its original discoverer).'
- Kenneth G. Elzinga, University of Virginia
`Both students and professors will welcome this original and unique collection. Analytically tighter and more complete expositions than much existing literature should be very welcome in graduate theory courses. Authors of history of economic thought texts will have to clarify and correct the historical record regarding who said what and when, and both reconfigure the assignment of credit and question use of the term "precursor": early users did more than hint at the full development; often creating tools.'
- Warren Samuels, Michigan State University
This is a unique account of the role played by 58 figures and diagrams commonly used in economic theory. These cover a large part of mainstream economic analysis, both microeconomics and macroeconomics and also general equilibrium theory.
The authoritative contributors have produced a well-considered and definitive selection including some from empirical research such as the Phillips curve, the Kuznets curve and the Lorenz curve. Almost all of them are still found in contemporary textbooks and research. Each entry presents an accurate and concise record of the history of the figure or diagram, including later developments and any controversy that arose in its development. As a whole, the book highlights how the use of geometric methods has played a central part in the development of economic theory and analysis; as a method of discovery, more commonly as a method of exposition and occasionally as a method of proof of propositions in economic theory and analysis.
This highly anticipated book will appeal to theorists in microeconomics or macroeconomics, scholars of economic theory and analysis, as well as students in microeconomics, general equilibrium theory or macroeconomics at the advanced undergraduate or graduate level who want a definitive account of some figure or diagram. Historians of economic thought and methodologists will also find this book an invaluable resource.
Contributors: S. Ashok, R.E. Backhouse, W.J. Baumol, M. Blaug, R. Boyer, L. Cameron, J.S. Chipman, A.J. Cohen, J.S. Cramer, J. Creedy, A.V. Deardorff, R.W. Dimand, A. Dixit, R. Dixon, B.C. Eaton, J. Eichberger, N. Erkal, R. Färe, L. Gangadharan, N. Giocoli, Y. Giraud, S. Grosskopf, H. Haller, D.W. Hands, G.C. Harcourt, T.M. Humphrey, R.W. Jones, N. Kakwani, M. Kemp, J.E. King, A.O. Krueger, D. Laidler, C. Lee, R.G. Lipsey, P. Lloyd, F. Maclachlan, R. Middleton, M. Nerlove, Y.-K. Ng, A. Panagariya, P. Rodenburg, R. Rothschild, M. Schneider, H.-l. Shi, A. Skinner, B.J. Spencer, H. Thompson, J. Whalley, R. Williams, W.C. Woo, A.D. Woodland, W. Young