Collected Works Of Maurice Dobb

Maurice Dobb was the foremost Marxian economist of his generation in Britain. He was noted for his contributions to value theory, the theory of economic planning and the analysis of Soviet economic development. This set will re-issue 7 of his most important works.

This volume collects published papers and essays from widely scattered and inaccessible sources, some of which appeared for the first time when this book was originally published. In the first part of the book the subjects range from the theory of wages and recent trends in economic theory to economists’ criticism of capitalism and socialism, investment-policy in under-developed countries, and economic growth under the Soviet Five Year Plans. The second part includes papers on Lenin and Marx, a study of the economic ideas of Bernard Shaw, and an essay on historical materialism.

This volume consists of lectures and articles by Maurice Dobb selected from among those delivered or written by him during the 1950s and 60s. It includes three lectures delivered at the University of Bologna on ‘Some Problems in the History of Capitalism’, two lectures on economic development given at the Delhi School of Economics, articles on the theory of development, and a number of articles on various questions of soviet economic planning contributed to specialist journals. The collection ends with a note in retrospect on Marx’s Das Kapital published in recognition of the centenary of the appearance of Volume One of that work in 1867.

The story of the economic development of the Soviet Union provided the first case in history of the establishment of a socialist economy and was therefore of great interest for economists and economic historians of the twentieth century. At the same time it affords a unique example of the transformation of a country into an industrial nation at an unprecedented pace and under the guidance of a national economic plan. This book examines these changes from the Russian Revolution of 1917 to 1927.

This book follows on from the author's volume Russian Economic Development and although it encompasses some of the same material it charts the history and progress of the Soviet economy down to the efforts at reconstruction after The Second World War. A new chapter was added which covers the post-war decade from the end of the war to the announcement of the Sixth Year Plan.

Maurice Dobb was the foremost Marxian economist of his generation in Britain. He was noted for his contributions to value theory, the theory of economic planning and the analysis of Soviet economic development. This set will re-issue 7 of his most important works.