Help in understanding a sentence read in Hobsbawm's book.

[sabyakgp]

Hello Friends,

While reading a book , On History by Eric Hobsbawm, I chanced upon the following sentence which I couldn't quite appreciate:

"In understanding such excercises historians seek models of the historical dynamics of captialism among the economists, and encounter only the generalities of rational-choice theory, except on the fringes , or perhaps better the frontier, of their dicipline" P.P 163

I don't quite understand the underlined part of the sentence.

Could anyone please help me understand it?

Regards,
Sabya

[Rover_KE]

"In understanding such excercises historians seek models of the historical dynamics of captialism among the economists, and encounter only the generalities of rational-choice theory, except on the fringes , or perhaps better the frontier, of their dicipline" P.P 163

Sorry, sabyakgp.

It appears to be in English, with a few spelling mistakes, but it's as clear as mud to me.

Goodness knows how a student is supposed to understand it.

Rover

[Tdol]

Rational choice theory - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
I presume he means that the economists who don't talk in such general terms are the ones who are not mainstream, but mavericks or others whose views are not so widely-accepted.

However, it's a very dense sentence that assumes an awful lot of knowledge about history and economics that I don't have.

[sabyakgp]

Yes, Hobsbawm always proves very difficult to interpret.