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The Austrian theory of the business cycle (henceforth ABC) frequently has been a target for critics of Austrian economics. In particular, a number of economists who are generally appreciative of other Austrian themes have singled out ABC as being, in one such critic's words, an “embarrassing excrescence” marring the otherwise generally sound body of modern Austrian thought.¹ Despite such criticisms, many Austrian economists persist in forwarding ABC as the best available, or perhaps even the only valid, explanation for the cycles of boom and bust regularly occurring in most modern, national economies.

Purpose – This chapter explores the changing definition of bipolar disorder, examining how debates within psychiatry actually construct the definition of mental illness, thereby creating the appearance of an emerging epidemic with increasing prevalence.

Method – I review the recent psychiatric and epidemiological research to reveal that the intellectual and scientific debates that occur in the psychological laboratory and in survey research are in fact falsely increasing the figures that show that an epidemic of bipolar is emerging.

Findings – For centuries, bipolar disorder was equated with severe psychosis and had a prevalence rate between 0.4% and 1.6%. As spectrum and subthreshold conceptions of bipolar disorder become established in official psychiatric diagnostic manuals, however, estimates of the prevalence of bipolar spectrum disorders have risen to almost 25%. I demonstrate that nearly all of this increase is a result of changes in the scientific and intellectual definition of bipolar disorders among psychiatric professionals, and that rates of symptoms are not in fact increasing.

Contribution to field – The arbitrariness of diagnostic thresholds naturally leads researchers to argue for lower thresholds. This allows more individuals who were previously considered psychiatrically normal to be reclassified as psychiatrically disordered. Lowering diagnostic thresholds increases the risk of confusing normal elation or sadness with disordered states, increasing the potential of false-positive diagnoses and the false impression of rising rates of disorder.

The thinking of the philosopher Baruch Spinoza is gradually entering the field of social science. In this paper, we are particularly interested in applying his theory of affects to the analysis of passionate collective behaviours at work in the field of financial markets. The general hypothesis that underpins our work is the idea that, in a context of radical uncertainty about the future, the succession of common affect regimes translates into passionate sequences that determine investor behaviour and produce market dynamics. Using an analysis of the stock market cycles of Taffler, Bellotti, and Agarwal (2018), Taffler, Agarwal, and Wang (2019), we show that the Spinozist concept of common affects can help us to understand the mechanisms in the production of collective emotion and to account for the speculative dynamics at the origin of the great financial bubbles.

While the formal structures of universities may predominantly reflect ceremonial rather than functional purposes, attempts at changing them are usually a fertile ground for academic conflicts. Taking this apparent contradiction as a starting point, the aim of this article is to explore the intriguing role of formal structures in academic settings. Drawing on a case study of a merger and organizational restructuring process in an academic research centre, it shows how symbolic responses to institutional pressures may have actual consequences on research practices, beyond myth and ceremony.

This paper presents the first estimates of Spanish infrastructure stock and investment for the period 1845–1935. Several sources and techniques have been used in the estimation, and the new series are reasonably reliable to the standards of historical statistics. Two distinct periods may be distinguished in the series: the years before 1895 (characterized by the prominence of railroads) and the period 1895–1935 (when most investment was addressed to other assets). The new series allow a preliminary comparison of the Spanish infrastructure endowment with that of the most advanced countries, showing a gradual process of convergence before 1936.