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Economic History and Economic Policy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 May 2012

BARRY EICHENGREEN
BARRY EICHENGREEN*
Affiliation:
Professor of Economics and Political Science, Department of Economics, University of California, Berkeley, 508-1 Evans Hall, Berkeley, CA 94720-3880 E-mail: eichengr@econ.berkeley.edu.
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Abstract

“The lessons of history” were widely invoked in 2008/09 as analysts and policymakers sought to make sense of the global financial crisis. Specifically, analogies with the early stages of the Great Depression of the 1930s were widely drawn. Building on work in cognitive science and literature on foreign policy making, this article seeks to account for the influence of this particular historical analogy and asks how it shaped both perceptions and the economic policy response. It asks how historical scholarship might be better organized to inform the process of economic policymaking. It concludes with some reflections on how research in economic history will be reshaped by the crisis.

Type
ARTICLES
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 72 , Issue 2 , 30 May 2012 , pp. 289 - 307
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 2012

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