Mainstream Mathematical Economics in the 20th Century

1. Front Matter

   Pages I-XIX

   PDF

2. Prolegomena

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 1-1

      PDF

   2. Cournot, Walras, and Edgeworth

      • P. Nicola

      Pages 3-16

3. The Founding Years: 1900–1949

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 17-17

      PDF

   2. Pareto and General Equilibrium

      • P. Nicola

      Pages 19-28

   3. Classical General Equilibrium

      • P. Nicola

      Pages 29-43

   4. Wald and Existence Proofs

      • P. Nicola

      Pages 45-48

   5. Early Game Theory

      • P. Nicola

      Pages 49-53

   6. Early Multisectoral Growth

      • P. Nicola

      Pages 55-59

   7. Dynamic Modelling

      • PierCarlo Nicola

      Pages 61-75

   8. Irving Fisher and Interest Theory

      • PierCarlo Nicola

      Pages 77-81

   9. Widening General Equilibrium Theory

      • PierCarlo Nicola

      Pages 83-93

   10. Applied General Equilibrium

       • PierCarlo Nicola

       Pages 95-100

4. Extensions, Finesses, and Formalism: 1950 on

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 101-103

      PDF

   2. Walras ‘cum’ Leontief

      • PierCarlo Nicola

      Pages 105-115

   3. From Classical to Modern Analysis

      • PierCarlo Nicola

      Pages 117-132

   4. Linear Programming and Extensions

      • Piercar Nicola

      Pages 133-141

   5. Consumer’s Analysis

      • Piercarlo Nicola

      Pages 143-166

   6. Firm’s Analysis

      • Piercarlo Nicola

      Pages 169-196

   7. General Competitive Equilibrium

      • Piercarlo Nicola

      Pages 197-215

To write everything about nothing, or to write nothing about everything: this is the problem. (Anonym, circa 1996-97) The first idea to write a book on M athematical Economics, more or less ordered in a historical sequence, occurred to me in 1995, when I was asked, by Istituto delta Enciclopedia Italiana, to write the entry "Storia dell'economia 1 2 matematica" , for the collective work "Storia deI XX Secolo". I thought that it would be interesting to elaborate on the text presented to the editors, to turn it into a book aiming at giving a panorama of what, in my opinion, are the main 20th century contributions to mathematical eco­ nomics. Of course, only a narrow set of the contributions made by economic theorists could be included, both for space limitations and necessity, because 3 of the limited competence of any single author. For instance, I have paid very limited attention to what is now called Macroeconomics, and also to Game Theory, which actually has grown so much as to acquire scientific in­ dependence as a living branch of applied mathematics. For the same reason, I have also left completely untouched such fields as Mathematical Finance, Public Economics, Theory of Taxation, etc. I have always based my presentation on published material only, assuming that what is contained in working papers still waits to be confirmed, possibly in the first years of the 21th century.

• Geschichte der mathematischen Ökonomie
• Mathematical economics
• Mathematische Ökonomie
• Volterra
• agents
• calculus
• economic theory
• game theory
• history of mathematical economics
• linear optimization
• modeling
• ökonomische Theorie

• Department of Mathematics, University of Milano, Milano, Italy

  PierCarlo Nicola

Policies and ethics