Abstract
There is a striking contrast between the significance of Harold Hotelling’s contribution to industrial economics and the fact that his location model was invalid, unrealistic and non-robust. It is difficult to make sense of the explanatory value of Hotelling’s model based on philosophical accounts that emphasize logical validity, representational adequacy, and robustness as determinants of explanatory value. However, these accounts are misleading because they overlook the context within which the explanatory value added of a model is apprehensible. We present Hotelling’s model in its historical context and show why it is an important and explanatory model despite its apparent deficiencies.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Journal | European Journal of the History of Economic Thought |
| Volume | 26 |
| Issue number | 5 |
| Pages (from-to) | 879-910 |
| Number of pages | 32 |
| ISSN | 0967-2567 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 3 Sep 2019 |
| MoE publication type | A1 Journal article-refereed |
Fields of Science
- 611 Philosophy
- explanation
- models
- idealization
- 511 Economics
- spatial competition
- Harold Hotelling
- Hotelling model
- principle of minimum differentiation