The contrastive approach to explanation is employed to shed light on the issue of the unrealisticness of models and their assumptions in economics. If we take explanations to be answers to contrastive questions of the form, then unrealistic elements such as omissions and idealizations are (at least partly) dependent on the selected contrast. These contrast-dependent assumptions are shown to serve the function of fixing the shared causal background between the fact and the foil. It is argued that looking at the explanations offered by economic models in contrastive terms helps to be precise about their explanatory potential, and hence, to assess the adequacy of their unrealistic assumptions. I apply the insights of the contrastive approach to the 'new economic geography’ models, and to a selection of criticisms directed at them. This case illustrates how a contrastive analysis can help the solution of disputes concerning the unrealisticness of particular models.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
file. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version under "Related research" (further below) or search for a different version of it.
References listed on IDEAS Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.: