Prepared for the reissue of Frank Knight's <I>The Economic Organization</I> by Transaction Books, which includes both "The Economic Organization" and "Notes of Utility and Cost." The introduction covers the context of Knight's writing his little textbook, its place in the history of Chicago price...</i>

The present study raises the following questions: To what extent is axiomatic general equilibrium analysis a rational reconstruction of Scottish Political Economy as defined by the writings of David Hume and Adam Smith? How much is gained and how much lost by the axiomatic transformation of the...

Ronald Coase (1910-2013), who sadly died at the remarkable age of 102, made significant contributions to economics based on common sense and the detailed study of his topics. Coase was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences in 1991 “for his discovery and clarification of the significance...

Is economics a science or a theology? Nelson sensibly argues that economists are a priestly class; they issue authoritative (scientific) blessings upon the marketplace. The bishops of this class are the mathematicians, who convert ideology into science. This essay, in contrast, argues that...

Is economics a science or a theology? Nelson sensibly argues that economists are a priestly class; they issue authoritative (scientific) blessings upon the marketplace. The bishops of this class are the mathematicians, who convert ideology into science. This essay, in contrast, argues that...

In this overview we give a short survey of the way in which the theory of the firm has been formulated within the `mainstream' of economics, both `past' and `present'. One aim is to give an outline of the historical developments that led to the contemporary theories. As to a breakpoint between...

This article investigates the expansion of the scope of economics in the 1960s. We show that the public policy problems raised by the issue of poverty reinforced the expansion, as economists became progressively involved in the social issues of the day. Until the early 1960s, poverty was a...

This is a revised edition of Walker (2017). New sections or subsections have been added on the X-inefficiency model, the division of labour and the firm - both pre and post-1970, ownership of the firm and the human capital based firm. Additions have been made to sections on entrepreneurship, the...

This survey gives an overview of the theory of the firm as it is formulated within the contemporary 'mainstream' of economics. Two groupings of theories are briefly discussed: principal-agent and incomplete contract models. Next, three of the most recent contributions regarding firms are...

This paper conducts a systematic comparison of behavioral economics’s challenges to the standard accounts of economic behaviors within three dimensions: under risk, over time and regarding other people. A new perspective on two underlying methodological issues, i.e., interdisciplinarity and...