Abstract
Economics, with the advantage of its model-building approach, has extended its influence into other fields of the social sciences and built up an academic imperialism that forced political science and sociology to adopt a retinal behavior assumption in their theories and econometric methods in the empirical works. However, because of the differences in the subject matters, the economics imperialism has not yet succeeded. In recent years, as the new institutionalism prospered in the field of economics, there has been a new movement toward integrating the social sciences, based on the wide adoption of institutional analysis in all fields of social sciences. Will the new institutionalism bring the social sciences back to a grand theory with communicable fields, or the another invasion of the economics imperialism? The answer depends on what the social scientists will do if each field of the social sciences can maintain the uniqueness of its institutional subject and develop new theories through applicators, as the new institutionalism becomes a common practice in each field, then the new institutionalism shall not be a reincarnation of economics imperialism. Therefore, there is a pretty good chance for a return of grand theory, based on the new institutionalism, in the social sciences.