Why Is Political Economy a Subfield in Comparative Politics and International Relations, but Not in American Politics? Lessons from the Past, Prescriptions for the Future

George A. Krause

Journal of Political Institutions and Political Economy, 2020, vol. 1, issue 3, 449-475

Abstract: This paper grapples with a complex and multifaceted issue. It seeks to understand why political economy has not been established as an institutionalized subfield in the field of American politics within the political science discipline. Establishing American political economy (APE) as a viable subfield is made extremely difficult, given the structural obstacles impeding both the development and maintenance of this subfield within American politics, as well as how the broader field of political economy has been defined in both comparative politics and international relations. In turn, this dilemma is of a reinforcing path-dependent nature that fosters incentives for scholars (and their research) to be housed within existing institutionalized subfields of American politics that are not compatible with the broader political economy field within the political science discipline. Recommendations are put forth, suggesting a path forward to create conditions that are conducive toward developing an institutionalized APE subfield that complements the field of American politics, while being compatible with the dominant subfield groups within the political economy field comprised of both comparative politics and international relations.

Keywords: American politics; political economy; institutional development of scholarly research fields (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1561/112.00000015 (application/xml)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:now:jnlpip:113.00000015

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Political Institutions and Political Economy from now publishers
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Lucy Wiseman ().