The Fellowship of Econometrics: Selection and Diverging Views in the Province of Mathematical Economics, from the 1930s to the 1950s

Two defining moments in the history of econometrics and in that of the Econometric Society are discussed in this essay. The first is the founding of the society and the initial skirmishes over the criteria for selecting its fellows, who were to represent the best practices of econometrics. The second was, twenty years later, the discussion about the nature of the mathematics adequate for the progress of econometrics. In both cases, some dissident views were presented, but whereas in the first period a pluralistic approach dominated, by the time of the second debate a more coherent and cohesive view was prevalent in econometric circles, to the discomfort of some of its founders.