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- Title
THE HARVARD DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS FROM THE BEGINNING TO WORLD WAR II.
- Authors
Mason, Edward S.
- Abstract
This article discusses the historical background of the Department of Economics at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In most American universities it is the department that defines the field of study, organizes the curriculum, and recommends appointments and promotions within the financial limits provided by the administration. Any appraisal, therefore, of the character and quality of American universities must concentrate on their departments. The Harvard Department of Economics, by all external tests, is a distinguished one. From its ranks have come two of the first three American Nobel Laureates in Economics and nine of the thirty-three presidents of the American Economic Association since World War II. It has been well represented in the awards and citations the profession bestows on its members. But it cannot be said that its history is one of uniform excellence. Furthermore, since economics is a subject inevitably concerned with issues of public importance and high political interest, the Harvard department has frequently found itself under attack both from the right and from the left. How it has weathered these attacks is an integral part of its history.
- Subjects
CAMBRIDGE (Mass.); MASSACHUSETTS; ACADEMIC departments; HARVARD University. Dept. of Economics; HARVARD University; ORGANIZATIONAL structure; PERFORMANCE standards
- Publication
Quarterly Journal of Economics, 1982, Vol 97, Issue 3, p383
- ISSN
0033-5533
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.2307/1885870