Between the 1930s and 1960s, economics evolved into a “modelling science,” producing knowledge primarily through small-scale mathematical models. The questions raised by this new research practice, the insights it generated, and the epistemic and policy aspirations linked to it form the starting point of Managing Growth in Miniature: Solow’s Model as an Artifact, written by Verena Halsmayer during her tenure as a senior research fellow at the Chair of Science Studies at the University of Lucerne. 

The book centres on the “neoclassical growth model”, which developed from a rather incidental by-product of other 1950s research into an epistemic standard in economics – at the expense of forms of knowledge that could not be expressed through models. Through a historical examination of various economic measurement and modelling practices, the study reveals how this model helped shape visions of a world characterised by stable growth. With its “heroic assumptions” – complete markets, no scarce resources and a frictionless future – the model became, in some circles, a symbol of market omnipotence and thus far more than a mere contribution to economic theory. By drawing attention to the tangible aspects of economic abstractions, the book demonstrates that the success of economic models depended less on their representational accuracy or empirical verifiability than on their efficiency, connectivity and interpretability.

The book, which was recently awarded the Best Monograph Award by the European Society for the History of Economic Thought, invites readers to reflect on the impact and limitations of models. It provides a basis for analysing how artefacts and infrastructures of economic knowledge continue to shape ideas and policies on economic growth to this day. 

Image: The standard visualisation of the neoclassical growth model, Robert M. Solow, “A Contribution to the Theory of Economic Growth,” The Quarterly Journal of Economics 70, no. 1 (1956): 65–94, 65.