Introduction to Do Economists Make Markets? On the Performativity of Economics

Donald MacKenzie, Fabian Muniesa and Lucia Siu
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Donald MacKenzie: University of Edinburgh
Lucia Siu: University of Edinburgh

A chapter in Do Economists Make Markets? On the Performativity of Economics, 2007 from Princeton University Press

Abstract: Around the globe, economists affect markets by saying what markets are doing, what they should do, and what they will do. Increasingly, experimental economists are even designing real-world markets. But, despite these facts, economists are still largely thought of as scientists who merely observe markets from the outside, like astronomers look at the stars. Do Economists Make Markets? boldly challenges this view. It is the first book dedicated to the controversial question of whether economics is performative--of whether, in some cases, economics actually produces the phenomena it analyzes. The book's case studies--including financial derivatives markets, telecommunications-frequency auctions, and individual transferable quotas in fisheries--give substance to the notion of the performativity of economics in an accessible, nontechnical way. Some chapters defend the notion; others attack it vigorously. The book ends with an extended chapter in which Michel Callon, the idea's main formulator, reflects upon the debate and asks what it means to say economics is performative. The book's insights and strong claims about the ways economics is entangled with the markets it studies should interest--and provoke--economic sociologists, economists, and other social scientists. In addition to the editors and Callon, the contributors include Marie-France Garcia-Parpet, Francesco Guala, Emmanuel Didier, Philip Mirowski, Edward Nik-Khah, Petter Holm, Vincent-Antonin Lépinay, and Timothy Mitchell.

Keywords: markets; performativity; financial derivatives; telecommunications auctions; transferable quotas (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Z13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2007
ISBN: 9780691130163
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (131)

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