The Method of the Witness Seminar

On May 28–29, 2010, twelve experimental economists gathered at the Dutch Royal Academy of Arts and Sciences in Amsterdam for a witness seminar on the history of the experiment in economics. Though the witness seminar has been used as an oral method of research in contemporary history and in the history of medicine and technology, this was its first extensive use in the history of economics. My contribution examines the witness seminar as a method of oral history, its merits and pitfalls, using this witness seminar on experimental economics as a nonrepresentative sample.