Various explanations have been put forward as to why the Keynesian revolution occurred. Some of these point to the temporal relevance of the General Theory while others highlight the importance of more anecdotal evidence, such as Keynes's relations with the Cambridge Circus. However, no systematic effort has been made to bring together these and other factors under one recognized framework of analysis. The present essay fills this gap by making use of an established tradition of work within the history of science literature devoted to identifying the intellectual, technical, institutional, psychological, and financial factors that help to explain why some research schools are successful and why others fail. The evidence suggests that this approach does indeed provide a coherent explanation as to why the revolution in macroeconomics during the 1930s and 1940s was Keynesian, this despite the fact that Keynes was far from being the only economist attempting to gain dominance for his ideas.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.