Economic history as it is and should be: Toward an open, honest, methodologically flexible, theoretically diverse, interdisciplinary exploration of the causes and consequences of economic growth

Economic history should take as its primary though not exclusive purpose the explication of the causes and consequences of economic growth. Scientific inquiry will be arbitrarily constrained unless the complementary strengths and weaknesses of different theory types and methods are appreciated, and the diverse causal linkages that economic historians must study are mapped. These changes would enhance the quality and value of economic history, and thus make the field more interesting for economists, historians, students, other scholars, and the taxpayer. This paper draws upon my experience as an economic historian, but also my research in economic methodology and interdisciplinary theory and practice, particularly my ongoing efforts to categorize the methods, types of theory, and phenomena of interest studied by scientists.