Staatswissenschaften and the Mathematical Policy Science of Jan Tinbergen

Abstract

The rise of mathematical economics is typically understood as a fundamental shift in the language and technique of economic theorizing. This article argues that an examination of Tinbergen's work demonstrates that a similar “mathematical” turn occurred in economic policy. This article contextualizes Tinbergen's professional career at the Dutch Central Bureau of Statistics and his early policy-oriented contributions as exemplified by the applied policy reports that he wrote between 1931 and 1936. His econometric work, including his seminal 1936 model of the Dutch economy and the closely related League of Nations model of the US economy, was rooted in his vision that business cycle research functioned in the service of the state. His work was aimed not at uncovering fundamental or structural relationships in the economy but at practical interventions in the economy by a state that developed control over new instruments of macroeconomic management. As such it can be and has been analyzed as an important contribution to economics as an engineering science. But this article demonstrates that Tinbergen also explicitly depicted the economy from the perspective of the policymaker and that he was attentive to the changing institutional order of the national and international economy. Tinbergen's work in this respect owed a great deal to the more political-economic tradition of German Staatswissenschaften than is typically acknowledged.