There’s an interesting VoxEU column by Coen Teulings about the economic history economics students ought to know. The list is terrific for learning about economic growth and development, including for example Jared Diamond’s classic [amazon_link id=”0141024488″ target=”_blank” ]Guns, Germs and Steel [/amazon_link]and Paul Bairoch’s [amazon_link id=”B009NO0MH0″ target=”_blank” ]Cities and Economic Development[/amazon_link], as well as more recent entries like Acemoglu and Robinson’s [amazon_link id=”1846684307″ target=”_blank” ]Why Nations Fail[/amazon_link]. However, there are some obvious omissions – David Landes’ [amazon_link id=”0349111669″ target=”_blank” ]Wealth and Poverty of Nations[/amazon_link], Joel Mokyr’s [amazon_link id=”0691120137″ target=”_blank” ]Gifts of Athena[/amazon_link], [amazon_link id=”0691090106″ target=”_blank” ]The Great Divergence[/amazon_link] by Kenneth Pomeranz, not to mention some straightforward histories of the Industrial Revolution such as Bob Allen’s [amazon_link id=”0521687853″ target=”_blank” ]The Industrial Revolution in Global Perspective[/amazon_link]. There are some less obvious omissions too – James Scott’s [amazon_link id=”0300078153″ target=”_blank” ]Seeing Like A State[/amazon_link], maybe?

[amazon_image id=”1846684307″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” ]Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity and Poverty[/amazon_image]

Economics students certainly need to have more history included in their courses – I would favour weaving it in as well as offering separate courses, because much as students claim to want to study economic history, I’m not at all sure they walk the talk in large numbers. However, the list in the VoxEU column is only one strand of economic history. For industrial organisation courses, for example, what’s needed is business history. The Mokyr book might feature, but so also Alfred Chandler’s [amazon_link id=”B00BR5MIXY” target=”_blank” ]The Visible Hand[/amazon_link], or his [amazon_link id=”B00L6K91RG” target=”_blank” ]book about DuPont[/amazon_link], say, or a terrific book I read recently about Bell Labs, Jon Gertner’s [amazon_link id=”1594203288″ target=”_blank” ]The Idea Factory[/amazon_link].

[amazon_image id=”1594203288″ link=”true” target=”_blank” size=”medium” ]The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation[/amazon_image]

I’m sure there are lots of other good suggestions out there – both books, and how to weave economic history into economic teaching. This summer I’m finalising my Public Policy Economics course to teach at the University of Manchester in the autumn so econ history suggestions for that are especially welcome.