The study traces this boundary in 43 college-level introductory economics textbooks from 1890 to 1960 using qualitative analysis and numerical coding of production-boundary frames.

The study traces this boundary in 43 college-level introductory economics textbooks from 1890 to 1960 using qualitative analysis and numerical coding of production-boundary frames.

• The production boundary is a suitable case because productive labour was central and contested in political economy, while explicit mainstream debate later appeared to disappear.
• Introductory textbooks bridge academic economics and other social institutions by training students in core frames and diffusing basic economic ideas, including discursive demarcations, to institutions.
  Evidence for this premise (1)

  What counts as productive? Redefining ‘producers’ in economic discourse, 1890–1960 — Textbook corpus and qualitative coding strategy

  introductory textbooks represent a key bridge between economics as an academic discipline and other social institutions.

  https://doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2024.2404355#unit-3-p2
• The textbook pool was drawn from the Library of Congress catalogue's HB 171.5 classification, which encompasses introductory economics textbooks.
  Evidence for this premise (1)

  What counts as productive? Redefining ‘producers’ in economic discourse, 1890–1960 — Textbook corpus and qualitative coding strategy

  Our sample of economic textbooks was drawn from the Library of Congress’ catalogue with the classification of HB 171.5

  https://doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2024.2404355#unit-3-p3
• Introductory textbooks clarify key concepts for non-specialists that discipline-focused books and journal articles often take for granted.
  Evidence for this premise (1)

  What counts as productive? Redefining ‘producers’ in economic discourse, 1890–1960 — Textbook corpus and qualitative coding strategy

  authors spend a great deal of time clarifying what they see as key conceptual points

  https://doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2024.2404355#unit-3-p1
• Alfred Marshall's 1890 Principles of Economics was added because of its importance to economic thought, producing a final sample of 43 textbooks.
  Evidence for this premise (1)

  What counts as productive? Redefining ‘producers’ in economic discourse, 1890–1960 — Textbook corpus and qualitative coding strategy

  We further added Alfred Marshall’s 1890 Principles of Economics given its importance to economic thought during this period

  https://doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2024.2404355#unit-3-p6
• The 1890–1960 period was selected because it isolates the rise of modern economics from classical political economy: 1890 captures emerging neoclassical economics, and by 1960 the modern production-boundary understanding was consolidated.
  Evidence for this premise (1)

  What counts as productive? Redefining ‘producers’ in economic discourse, 1890–1960 — Textbook corpus and qualitative coding strategy

  We restricted our time period from 1890 to 1960 because these years isolate the rise of the modern discipline of economics

  https://doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2024.2404355#unit-3-p4
• To retain texts in reasonably wide circulation and focus on college-level introductions, the authors selected multiple-edition texts and removed high-school textbooks; this reduced 638 texts to 42.
  Evidence for this premise (1)

  What counts as productive? Redefining ‘producers’ in economic discourse, 1890–1960 — Textbook corpus and qualitative coding strategy

  This turned a list of 638 texts into the more analytically manageable and meaningful sample of 42 texts.

  https://doi.org/10.1080/03085147.2024.2404355#unit-3-p5

These are challenges this argument’s reasoning pattern must still withstand. Answering them on Isonomia strengthens the argument.

• Does the case fit the category?Open

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