We econometricians share the stage of ‘’metrics’’ with a lot of other disciplines. Think of biometrics, which deals with data concerning fingerprints, DNA, face recognition and more. Or even psychometrics, whose aim is to measure psychological features such as intelligence or other personality traits. A well-known personality test is the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. But have you ever heard of cliometrics? This science is the application of ‘’metrics’’ to the past.
What is cliometrics?
The name Cliometrics has a certain mythical origin. The term was coined in 1960 by economist Stanley Reiter, who named it after one of the Greek Muses. Her name was Clio, the Muse of history. This ‘’new’’ economic history marked a big change in the usage of quantitative sources in historical research. Traditionally, economic history was dominated by historians, who used quantitative sources mainly to support or strengthen their narrative arguments. But the area of expertise shifted when academically-trained economists started to use their quantitative methods as a primary method to analyze history. Different explanations of historical events, such as the rise of mercantilism, could now no longer be simply reduced to a different interpretation of historical records. Instead, these historical theories could be rigorously tested in order to uncover the truth.
Cliometrics lends much of its techniques from econometrics, and both sciences rely on having access to big datasets. For cliometricians however, the data-gathering process is much more cumbersome. Instead of extracting insights from big data, they look at old financial reports, tax records, newspapers etc. Still, the volume of this data is substantial, and the rise of modern computing technology greatly aided the development of cliometrics. Having said that, another hurdle for cliometricians is the fact that their data is more prone to measurement error. Less regulation and less advanced measurement techniques lead to less reliable estimations.
A controversial example
A concrete example of academic work involving cliometrics might help to illustrate what cliometrics is exactly about. In 1974, the book ‘’Time on the Cross: The Economics of American Negro Slavery’’ was published by economists Robert Fogel and Stanley L. Engerman. This work dealt with a very sensitive topic and became very controversial after its publication. Aside from the obvious (and significantly more important) moral implications, most people agreed on the long-standing notion that slavery was also economically inefficient. The slaves themselves had no financial incentive to work and the slave-owners had to deal with the risk of ‘’sunk costs’’ as the initial capital investment of slaves is high compared to paying a worker an hourly salary. The authors, however, came to a radically different conclusion than what was the general consensus at that time.
Instead of looking at qualitative accounts, the authors gathered as much data as possible about quantifiable economic variables, such as prices, productivity, and profit. The result? Slavery is, from a purely economic perspective, very profitable and efficient. This finding naturally led to a lot of media attention, both positive and negative. In the academic community, people were impressed with the accurate implementation of objective cliometric research, but they also felt that the ‘’unquantifiable’’ side of slave wellbeing had been overly rationalized.
Philosophy of science
The researchers of the book were by no means advocates for the use or justification of slavery. On the contrary, their research demonstrated that slavery would not have collapsed on its own, thereby reinforcing the necessity of the American Civil War to end it. Still, we can’t help but ponder if such a quantitative approach is really sufficient to capture all the moral and social complexities of human history. The social sciences are increasingly implementing the use of empirical research methods, but we shouldn’t forget the importance of more qualitative arguments. It’s easy to drown in all the numbers and lose sight of the bigger picture. If we reduce every social phenomenon into measurable variables, do we risk losing sight of the very humanity we seek to understand?
For those who think we need not less, but more mathematics in the analysis of history, I would recommend taking a look into the fascinating field of cliodynamics. This discipline takes steps even further, incorporating ideas from the natural sciences, macrosociology and of course cliometrics. Essentially, it treats history as a dynamical system. Definitely something to think about.
References
Goldin, C. (1995). Cliometrics and the Nobel. Journal of economic perspectives, 9(2), 191-208.