Survey course that in part explores gender in the history of economics, induction vs. deduction, and criticisms of political economy. Reading list includes Blaug's Economic Theory in Retrospect and Rima's Development of Economic Analysis, as well as Say's novel Olbie and Smith's "Digression on Corn Laws."

First of a two-part course on the history of economics. Focuses on the theoretical development of classical political economy up to 1870 in the works of the physiocrats, Smith, Ricardo, and Marx. Emphasizes the contrasts and similarities between classical and neoclassical theories. Required texts are The Worldy Philosophers and Teachings from the Worldly Philosophy, both by Robert Heilbroner.

Major sections of the course are as follows: "Should the World Economic Crisis Prompt Us to Rethink the History of Economics?"; "Natural Laws and Social Laws"; "Classical Economics and the Substance Theory of Value"; "Economics as Social Physics: Early Neoclassical Economics"; "How America Got the Orthodoxy It Deserved"; and "The Past as a Glimpse of the Future." Required texts are Backhouse's Puzzle of Modern Economics, Mirowski's More Heat Than Light, and Roncaglia's Wealth of Ideas.

Course begins with Mandeville's Grumbling Hive. Subjects include virtue and the moral sentiments, the early socialists, and early feminist economists, as well as the roots of the recession that began in 2007–8. Readings are from Folbre, Greed, Lust, and Gender: A History of Economics Ideas (Oxford University Press, 2009); Cassidy, How Markets Fail (Farrar Strauss, 2009); and Hayek, The Road to Serfdom.