A Bibliometrical Analysis of Thorstein Veblen's writings and ideas

Abstract Thorstein Veblen’s work was a cornerstone in American economics during the late 19th and early 20th century. Veblen is usually characterized as a founding father of American Institutionalism, which competed with Neoclassical Economics in the mainstreaming process of American economics during the first half of the 20th century. Given the huge Veblen’s writings impact on economics, it is possible to find mainstream economics papers that mention Veblen’s contribution – hence, they would be not an exclusivity of the heterodox approach. The goal of our study is to investigate how papers published by heterodox and mainstream journals deal with Veblen’s writings. Our investigation is based on a bibliometric analysis to identify Veblen’s economics ideas as referenced in papers published by top heterodox and mainstream journals. Bibliometry is also applied in our paper to build indicators and analyze patterns.