A11 - Role of Economics; Role of Economists; Market for EconomistsNávrat zpět

The paper poses the question whether the economics of science could be the key to economic methodology. First, the sociology of science, which tries to put science in social context, is described. Then, the economic approach to science, inspired by Tullock, Stigler and Becker, is explained. We point out the problem of circle, according to which putting science in context does not imply relativism as concerns the truth. This conclusion underlines the Popperian message of the paper.

Publications in foreign or domestic scientific journals are an important part of research output. And so is the citation feedback on these publications, which is done by other scientists in this field of science. One of the tools which can effectively and impartially evaluate the publication and citation level of a scientist is the h-index. The groundwork for its calculation is drawn on the most prestigious citation and publication database which is Web of Science. What is the quality of the records in this database and what are the other problems than can occur while using it? This paper describes all that and much more.

In this paper I am trying to provide the reader with a brief overview of contemporary discussion about recently frequently mentioned topic of economics and happiness. In the last few years the number of publications related to happiness from the economic perspective growth exponentially. As the importance of this topic seems to grow significantly, I modestly intend to provide Czech public with a very starting reference point for further research in this field. In the first part I sum up the basic terms of subjective well-being and Easterlin paradox and give an overview of the most striking empirical observations. The second part shortly describes approach to the happiness problem of selected key historical personalities, namely Aristotle, Smith and Genovesi. In the third part I outline present key challenge for the economic theory - tackling with the reciprocity phenomenon.

The article contributes to the growing body of literature dealing with the bibliometric evaluation of the Czech economic research. In particular, this article introduces a recently invented measure of both the scientific output and impact - the Hirsch index (h) - into the Czech academic economics. While the theoretical part of the article contains a discussion of the strenghts and weaknesses of the Hirsch approach, the empirical part presents two original top50s of the Czech economists ranked by their individual h's. The first of our charts comes from the Web of Science's General Search dataset, and the second one reflects the use of the Web of Science's Cited Reference Search dataset. Both datasets cover the 1980-2006 period. It appears that the rate of correspondence among the top 25 economists in each chart and the top25 of the celebrated Turnovec's citation-based ranking (2005) amounts to 60%. In addition, our empirical results reveal that the elite Czech economists attain h's being 3-10 times lower than the h's of the foreign academic "superstars".

The author addresses the question of interdisciplinary studies based on his own experience. His negative experiences are confirmed by the results of a quantitative survey demonstrating that the proportion of citations from other disciplines is very low in four examined fields (economics, law, political science and sociology). But the overall picture is colored by positive examples: the theory of rational choice and game theory have broken the bounds of economics. Also multivariable regression analyses of time series of a large number of countries are not confined to economic phenomena. The spread of interdisciplinary studies is also shown in the way system paradigm has become a widely applied general approach. The author ends with three proposals: let us have a minimum conversancy with other disciplines, support interdisciplinary work, and promote the emergence of a new type of "social scientist".

We survey the state-of-the-art methods of how to rank economic departments and economists on the basis of 14 studies conducted in years 1995-2005. We cover a diversity of rankings: U.S., worldwide, E.U., those of developed academic nations and those of developing academic nations. Each method rests on a specific goal: while some identify top-notch research, others reflect quantity and thus are able to discriminate down the ranking. We also document novelties in ranking-construction such as sensitivity analysis, parallel rankings, instant updates and journal weights based on impact-adjusted impact factors.

The Council of Economic Experts and its influence on the German economic policy are discussed in this paper. The first section concentrates on the institutional background and historical genesis of this body. Consequently, the importance of the Council in preventing a competitive and efficient economic order in the ordoliberal point of view is considered. The second section offers a comparative analysis of economic policy consultancy. Some significant institutional aspects of the German Council of Economic Experts, the US Council of Economic Advisers and the French Conseil d'Analyse Économique are examined.

Executive Board intends to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the foundation of a Czech professional economic journal by publishing in Volume 2003 articles that will deal with the history, development, peripeteias , twists and turns of Politická ekonomie. Issue No. 6 is focused on the period 1979 - 1989.

Executive Board intends to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the foundation of a Czech professional economic journal by publishing in Volume 2003 articles that will deal with the history, development, peripeteias, twists and turns of Politická ekonomie. Issue No. 5 is focused on the period 1971 - 1978.

Czech economic thought during the 1948 - 1969 was full of sudden turns. Its development was determined by political conditions and spiritual climate that were result of Stalinist soviet type socialism. During the first half of the 1950s the plurality of economic ideas was substituted by the Stalinist version of marxist-leninist political economy using violent methods. Low efficiency of the command system and emerging reform climate in the USSR under N. S. Khrushchev opened the door to the reform thinking of the second half of 1950s and the 1960s in Czechoslovakia. During the 1960s the development of the reform thinking together with renaissance of the theoretical economic thinking culminated in the economic reform of Otto Šik and his team, and democratization process of the Prague Spring of 1968. Promising developments ended as a consequence of the Warsaw Treaty troops invasion in August 1968.

Executive Board intends to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the foundation of a Czech professional economic journal by publishing in Volume 2003 articles that will deal with the history, development, peripeteias, twists and turns of Politická ekonomie. Issue No 4 is focused on the period 1967 - 1970.

Executive Board intends to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the foundation of a Czech professional economic journal by publishing in Volume 2003 articles that will deal with the history, development, peripeteias, twists and turns of Politická ekonomie. Issue No. 3 is focused on the period 1963-1966.

Executive Board intends to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the foundation of a Czech professional economic journal by publishing in Volume 2003 articles that will deal with the history, development, peripeteias, twists and turns of Politická ekonomie. Issue No. 2 will be focused on the period 1958 - 1962.