Theorising Risk and Uncertainty in Social Enquiry: Exploring the Contribution of Frank Knight

Darryl S. L. Jarvis

History of Economics Review, 2010, vol. 52, issue 1, 1-26

Abstract: The problem of risk and uncertainty continues to plague social scientific enquiry, and thereby ostensibly imposes epistemological limits to knowledge. In this paper I explore this issue in relation to the writings and theoretical contributions of Frank Knight, one of the most illustrious economic thinkers of the twentieth century. Knight’s contributions essentially constructed a means for assessing and measuring risk in various facets of social activity. However, despite Knight’s insights and the methodological schema he constructed for probability analysis, remarkably few scholars from the social sciences have drawn upon his work. Ironically, Knight long ago bequeathed to us much that we need to know to theorise more effectively and accommodate risk and uncertainty.

Date: 2010
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/18386318.2010.11682161 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

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:taf:rherxx:v:52:y:2010:i:1:p:1-26

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/rher20

DOI: 10.1080/18386318.2010.11682161

Access Statistics for this article

History of Economics Review is currently edited by John Harry Bloch and John Hawkins

More articles in History of Economics Review from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().