*Economics imperialism* is about power¹ & interdisciplinary and, of course, has a history. Here you go @causalinf and @Undercoverhist 1/n

¹ Power like in explanatory power & at the same time/ especially power as expressed by differential funding of phds in social sciences
2/ Recent debates started by a big and loud “economists do it better, no?” that characterizes not every econ, but a culture within the profession. On this, good reference is “The superiority of economics” by Fourcade, Ollion and Algan https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/jep.29.1.89
3/ What I think is very interesting in the paper is the tentative to measure interdisciplinarity (or a sort of epistemic curiosity/engagment) using citations *accross* disciplines and shows the relative insularity of economics. Bc what is at stake is frontiers & dialogue yeay
4/ The first use of the term is attributed to econ Ralph W. Souter in 1933 (Swedberg 1990) to imply the unification of all social sciences around one object, individuals in society, by an “enlightened and democratic” economics imperialism. #theWhiteManBurden 😶
5/ The first works generally *labeled* as economics
imperialism are Becker’s (1957) model of discrimination and Downs’ (1957) economic analysis of politics. And you have a gigantic debate on the diffusion/reapropriation of Robbins' definition of economics in the background
[intermission sorry]
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