Anticipations Of The General Theory

This book examines the much-debated question of whether John Maynard Keynes' greatest work—The General Theory of Employment Interest and Money—was an instance of Mertonian simultaneous scientific discovery. In part I of this study, Don Patinkin argues for Keynes' originality, rejecting the claims of the Stockholm school and the Polish economist Michal Kalecki. Patinkin shows that the theoretical problems to which the Stockholm school and Kalecki devoted their attention largely differed from those of the General Theory and that, even when the problem addressed was similar, the treatment they accorded it was not part of their central messages. In the remaining parts of the book Patinkin presents a critique of Keynes' theory of effective demand and discusses Keynes' monetary theory and policy thinking, as well as the relationship between the respective developments of Keynesian theory and national income accounting in the 1930s.

First published in 1988. Most of the articles reprinted in this collection were based on material developed for the author's students in order to assist them in understanding the theories of Michal Kalecki, John Maynard Keynes and Joan Robinson. Each article is self-contained, but together the articles provide an introduction to the important contributions of these three economists that also makes clear the interrelations between their theories. The treatment of their theories in these articles is sympathetic, but not uncritical.

This second volume contains essays which relate to developments in Keynes' scholarship and theorizing in the years since his death and demonstrates the ongoing validity of the Keynesian tradition.