The advance of the mathematization process in the Brazilian academy of Economics since the 1980s

Abstract

Looking at the economic discourse, we try to study in this article how has mathematization in economics advanced in Brazil in the last three decades. To see this, we have classified into several categories all articles published in three major economic journals of the country (Revista Brasileira de Economia, Estudos Econômicos and Revista de Economia Política) and the publications made in the meetings ANPEC from 1981 to 2010, according to the type of argument used. The total of articles analyzed adds up to 5.733. We try to see how the path of economic discourse, making it more mathematical, did develop. We found that there was an increased use of a formalized language from the mid-1990s onwards. Finally, to confirm our findings, we focus on the process of mathematization through the observation of quantitative variable: equations per article.

mathematization; process; discourse