The recent Nobel Prizes in economics have been a succession of gifts to economic history. Three years ago, it was Ben Bernanke, with an enormously influential doctoral thesis on monetary policy during the Great Depression that was the foundation for the expansionary policies that enabled a rapid exit from the Great Recession. This is one of the cases in which the study of the past and its improved understanding have allowed for the deployment of better monetary policies in the present. Bernanke himself was responsible for steering the Federal Reserve through some of its worst moments, minimizing the impact of the crisis and preventing it from becoming a new Great Depression. Two years ago, we had Claudia Goldin, who has studied the improvement of female education in the United States since the 19th century and has been able to document how women entered the labor market, how they achieved improved wages, and why pay inequalities persisted. One year ago, Daron Acemoglu, James A. Robinson, and Simon Johnson welcomed her to explain how institutions are formed and how they affect the prosperity of countries. This year, half of the prize went to Joel Mokyr for explaining the technological prerequisites for sustained economic growth. The other half—Philippe Aghion and Peter Howitt—has championed a concept as dynamic and unsettling as "creative destruction," a Schumpeterian concept: another nod to the classics of economic history.
All the cases are contributions that steer clear of a priori assumptions and dogmatism, as we economic historians like to see them. But they are filled with strong civic convictions and public service. Many are beacons of the world we live in: the necessary prudence of monetary policy, the beneficial integration and advancement of women in the workplace, the indispensability of inclusive institutions (representative and with legal certainty for all citizens), and the virtues of curiosity for knowledge, which should not be stymied by every concept and visionary. In the world we live in, some of these values seem highly questionable. A prudent monetary policy, aware of the lessons of the past, is under attack by the US president. The progressive improvement in women's professional qualifications appears threatening to macho eyes, accustomed to the monopoly of knowledge and power. Representative institutions that provide legal security for all are considered, to the surprise of their moderate defenders, "communist," according to some top-level political leaders. The freedom of thought and experimentation that flourished in 18th-century Britain would now be frowned upon by many, even by many of our fellow countrymen. Entrepreneurial achievements based on new technologies fascinate us and, at the same time, frighten us.
What is happening to us? The fear of change and its speed explains much of the anxiety in the contemporary world. Change can be perceived as threatening by many: loss of privilege, loss of power, loss of influence, loss of relevance, loss of significance. This fear seems unacceptable to us when it is exploited by the most powerful, who agitate for it to demand more power for themselves. But we should be careful not to criminalize the fear of change of the less powerful, who may feel much more threatened than we might think. Movements that seem reactionary, regressive, and involutionary to us deserve attention, not disdain or indifference. Fears are great activators of collective action. The most unnerving movements in contemporary history are accumulations of fears condensed by very daring and unscrupulous leaders, yet who have managed to achieve unimaginable citizen consensus. We do not refuse to analyze them, to understand their roots. We will see how powerful personal insecurity, the threat to property rights, the threat of expropriation, the threat of loss of privilege, or the threat of social declassification are. What traumas and fears are overturning citizens' moral priorities? A dispassionate—investigative—perspective must help us shed more light on what is happening. Disqualifications don't help. Thinking, analyzing, and understanding do. This applies to immigration and those who demonize or idealize it, to the shrinking supply of rental apartments, to the fear of technological change that threatens established positions but also activates new hopes and capabilities. Economic history offers us more dispassionate perspectives—perhaps even too dispassionate—but rich in understanding and mental flexibility. And, now, we need them sorely.
