The Methodological Basis of Institutional Economics: Pattern Model, Storytelling, and Holism

What can be said about the truth value of explanations found in institutional economics? Consideration of the question requires a review of a number of other issues. To discuss the truth value of propositions requires a consideration of models of explanation. Since institutionalism's mode of explanation has developed, at least in part, in reaction to standard economics, the models of explanation underlying both standard and institutional economics must be analyzed and compared. This essay seeks to discover the model of explanation implicit in insti-