Repo rate decisions are central to the communication of monetary policy but they do not constitute the only channel by which such policy is communicated. A more comprehensive analysis of the signaling aspect of monetary policy requires study of all relevant channels, including discursive channels such as meeting minutes, press releases etc. This opens up […]
Conceptual precision is often regarded as a scholarly virtue by economists. This paper explores the scope and promise of definitionalism in economics by focusing on concepts that act as founding concepts in economic debate. The semantic properties of these founding concepts are investigated on the basis of a revised Fregean account of meaning, which reinterprets […]
Multiple interpretations of the concept of bounded rationality are currently employed across the social sciences and beyond. This paper studies the emergence of ‘bounded rationality’ from the 19th century conceptual field of ‘limited’ and ‘finite’ intelligence. This field broadened in the first half of the 20th century to encompass related concepts such as ‘incomplete’, ‘limited’, […]
That Coase’s political convictions changed from an early socialism to a later neo-liberalism stands in apparent contrast to the theoretical consistency of his early (’The Nature of the Firm’) and later (’The Problem of Social Cost’) contributions to economics. Offering further evidence about his early views in particular, this paper takes a fresh look at […]
Reflexivity has been argued to be self-defeating and potentially devastating for the sociology of scientific knowledge. We first survey various meanings associated with the concept of reflexivity, and then provide an interpretation of Velázquez’ Las Meninas to generate a three-part taxonomy of reflexivity, distinguishing between ‘immanent’, ‘epistemic’, and ‘transcendent’ reflexivity. This provides the basis for […]
The adoption of telematics has at times proceeded at a painfully slow pace in public administrations and health authorities. This paper tells the story of the emergence and benefits of a telematic-based system in the Scottish health service: telemedicine in Edinburgh and Lothian community maternity care. It looks at the role of visions, the strategies […]
This article has been motivated by the inquiry of the National Heritage Committee of the British House of Commons into the price of compact discs in 1993. Its general thrust is to foster the dialogue between sociological approaches to the study of innovation and microeconomic theory. To do this, it presents a comprehensive case study […]