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Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations: A Story of Economic Discovery. By David Warsh. New York: W. W. Norton, 2006. xxii + 426 pp. Index. Cloth, $27.95. ISBN: 0-393-05996-0.
Reviewed by Michael A. Bernstein
A financial affairs and economics journalist, David Warsh has written a lively "story of economic discovery." The operative term is "story." Far from being either a history of economic theory or a narrative of the evolution of the economics profession, Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations is at one and the same time an engaging and highly idiosyncratic rendering of enduring debates that have framed and characterized the evolution of the field since the eighteenth century. Warsh is a gifted writer, and he has a wonderful ability to transform arid scholarly communications into exciting, pithy, and meaningful colloquies. Indeed, Part One of the volume (by far Ae better of two) may properly be read as a thorough and enlightening survey of economic-growth theory from Adam Smith to Robert Solow. Even so, the book also suffers from its journalistic bias-a tendency to avoid precision and detail for the sake of the broad vista, all the while doing damage to the facts and, at times, missing key points. I might add that, as a work of scholarly reflection and assessment, the book is disappointing. Warsh did not craft this work as an intellectual contribution but, rather, wrote it as a kind of academic morality play. This strategy may help to sell books, but it does not anchor important and original contributions to learning.
Fascinated with how economists have struggled to understand (and with how they often misconstrue) the role of knowledge in the creation of "the wealth of nations," Warsh uses Paul Romer's influential 1990 Journal of Political Economy article, "Endogenous Technological Change," as a platform on which to construct his entire narrative. The publication of that essay, Warsh believes, constituted a crucial step forward...