Cliometrics

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Application of econometrics and other formal methods to the study of history

title: "Cliometrics" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["economic-history-studies", "econometric-modeling", "historiometry"] description: "Application of econometrics and other formal methods to the study of history" topic_path: "history" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cliometrics" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Application of econometrics and other formal methods to the study of history ::

Cliometrics (, also ), sometimes called ''''new economic history''''{{cite journal | jstor =2593168 | title =The New Economic History. Its Findings and Methods | first =Robert | last =Fogel | author-link =Robert W. Fogel |date= December 1966 | journal =Economic History Review |volume=19 |issue=3 |pages=642–656 | quote =The 'new economic history', sometimes called economic history or cliometrics, is not often practiced in Europe. However, it is fair to say that efforts to apply statistical and mathematical models currently occupy the centre of the stage in American economic history. | doi=10.1111/j.1468-0289.1966.tb00994.x | jstor =202334 | title =Economic History and Economic Theory: The New Economic History in America | first =Harold | last =Woodman | year =1972 | journal =Journal of Interdisciplinary History |volume=3 |issue=2 |pages=323–350 | quote =Among the most recent of the changes in emphasis-today's new history-is the rise of the "new economic history" or, as it is variously called, econometric history or cliometric. | doi =10.2307/202334

There has been a revival in 'new economic history' since the late 1990s. ::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Pierre_Mignard_001.jpg" caption="[[Clio]] by [[Pierre Mignard]], oil on canvas, 1689"] ::

History

The new economic history originated in 1958 with The Economics of Slavery in the Antebellum South by American economists Alfred H. Conrad and John R. Meyer. The book caused much controversy with its claim, based on statistical data, that slavery would not have ended in the absence of the U.S. Civil War, as the practice was economically efficient and highly profitable for slaveowners.

The term cliometrics—which derives from Clio, the name of the muse of history—was originally coined by mathematical economist Stanley Reiter in 1960. Cliometrics became better known when Douglass North and William Parker became the editors of the Journal of Economic History in 1960. The Cliometrics Meetings also began to be held around this time at Purdue University and are still held annually in different locations.

North, a professor at Washington University in St. Louis, would go on to win the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in October 1993 along with Robert William Fogel, himself often described as the father of modern econometric history and Neo-historicals. The two were honoured "for having renewed research in economic history;" the Academy noted that "they were pioneers in the branch of economic history that has been called the 'new economic history,' or cliometrics." Fogel and North received the prize for turning the theoretical and statistical tools of modern economics on the historical past: on subjects ranging from slavery and railroads to ocean shipping and property rights. North was heralded as a pioneer in the "new" institutional history. In the Nobel announcement, specific mention was made of a 1968 paper on ocean shipping, in which North showed that organizational changes played a greater role in increasing productivity than did technological change. Fogel is especially noted for using careful empirical work to overturn conventional wisdom.

With that being said, the new economic history revolution is thought to have begun in the mid-1960s, where areas of key interest included transportation history, slavery, and agriculture. The discipline was resisted as many incumbent economic historians were either historians or economists who had very little connection to economic modeling or statistical techniques.{{cite journal | last = Goldin | first = Claudia | author-link = Claudia Goldin |date= Spring 1995 | title = Cliometrics and the Nobel | journal = The Journal of Economic Perspectives | volume = 9 | issue = 2 | pages = 191–208 [p. 194] | jstor = 2138173 | doi=10.1257/jep.9.2.191 | s2cid = 155075681 | url = http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:30703876 | url-access= subscription

Cliometrics was introduced in the 1970s to Germany by Richard H. Tilly, who had been educated in the US. The Cliometric Society, a group to encourage and further the study of cliometrics, was founded in 1983.

There has been a revival in 'new economic history' since the late 1990s. The number of papers on economic history published in the top economics journals has increased in the last decades, comprising 6.6% of articles in the American Economic Review and 10.8% of articles in the Quarterly Journal of Economics for the period 2004-2014. Today, cliometric approaches are standard in several journals, including the Journal of Economic History, Explorations in Economic History, the European Review of Economic History, and Cliometrica.

Critics

Cliometrics has had sharp critics. Francesco Boldizzoni summarized a common critique by arguing that cliometrics is based on the false assumption that the laws of neo-classical economics always apply to human activity. He considers that those laws are based on rational choice and maximization as they operate in well-developed markets and do not apply to economies other than those of the capitalist West in the modern era. Instead, Boldizzoni argues that the workings of economies are determined by social, political, and cultural conditions specific to each society and time period.

On the other hand, Claude Diebolt (2016) argued that cliometrics is mature and well accepted by scholars as an "indispensable tool" in economic history. He believes that most scholars agree that economic theory combined with new data as well as historical and statistical methods are necessary to formulate problems precisely, to draw conclusions from postulates, and to gain insight into complex processes so as to close the gap between Geisteswissenschaften and Naturwissenschaften: to move from the historical verstehen (understanding) side to the economic erklären (explaining) side or, much better, mixing both approaches for the achievement of a unified approach of the social sciences. At the applied level, cliometrics is accepted to measure variables and estimate parameters.

Joseph T. Salerno criticizes Cliometrics from the perspective of the Austrian school of economics, defending instead the methods of Ludwig von Mises.{{cite book | first =Murray | last =Rothbard | title =A History of Money and Banking in the United States: The Colonial Era to World War II | publisher =Ludwig von Mises Institute | year =2002 | isbn =978-0945466338

Distinguishing cliometrics and cliodynamics

Cliometrics and cliodynamics share the scientific ambition of using quantitative tools and historical data to test general historical principles. Both fields endeavor to gather large amounts of historical data across big samples. However, the two fields also differ in several ways.

Cliodynamics maintains a close relationship with the natural sciences, often employing dominant methods from the natural sciences such as differential-equation models, power-law relations, and agent-based models. Evolutionary game theory and social network analysis are also frequently employed by cliodynamicists, but less often by cliometricians. Cliodynamicists also tend to include factors associated with ecological context and biological determinants in their models.

References

References

  1. (2016). "Handbook of Cliometrics". Springer.
  2. [[Edward L. Glaeser]], [https://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/27/remembering-the-father-of-transportation-economics/ "Remembering the Father of Transportation Economics"], ''The New York Times'' (Economix), October 27, 2009.
  3. (2017-01-23). "The Long Economic and Political Shadow of History, Volume 1".
  4. Abramitzky, Ran. (2015). "Economics and the Modern Economic Historian". [[Journal of Economic History]].
  5. (1958). "The Economics of Slavery in the Ante Bellum South". [[Journal of Political Economy]].
  6. Goldin, Claudia. (Spring 1995). "Cliometrics and the Nobel". The Journal of Economic Perspectives.
  7. The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 1993, [http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economics/laureates/1993/press.html Press Release], October 12, 2003.
  8. (2017-10-28). "A cliometric counterfactual: what if there had been neither Fogel nor North?". Cliometrica.
  9. (2017-01-01). "A Cliometric Counterfactual: What if There Had Been Neither Fogel nor North?". Working Papers of BETA.
  10. North, Douglass C.. (1968). "Sources of Productivity Change in Ocean Shipping, 1600-1850". [[Journal of Political Economy]].
  11. Fogel, R.. (1964). "Railroads and American Economic Growth: Essays in Econometric History". The Johns Hopkins University Press.
  12. Goldin, Claudia. (Spring 1995). "Cliometrics and the Nobel". The Journal of Economic Perspectives.
  13. "Verleihung des Helmut-Schmidt-Preises 2009 an Richard Hugh Tilly".
  14. Boldizzoni, Francesco. (2011). "The Poverty of Clio: Resurrecting Economic History". Princeton University Press.
  15. (2016). "Cliometrica after 10 years: definition and principles of cliometric research". Cliometrica.
  16. Diebolt, Claude. (2012). "Where Are We Now in Cliometrics? Kliometrie: wo stehen wir heute?". Historical Social Research.
  17. Salerno, Joseph. (2002). "History of Money and Banking in the United States: The Colonial Era to World War II". [[Mises Institute]].
  18. Mejía, Javier. (2015). "The Evolution of Economic History since 1950: From Cliometrics to Cliodynamics". Tiempo & Economia.

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economic-history-studieseconometric-modelinghistoriometry