Keynes And The Quest For A Moral Science

Parson (policy analysis, U. of London) clears away the mechanistic and positivistic language and ideology that has surrounded the work of the British economist to find a social scientist and philosopher rooted in an alchemical fascination with the art of transmutation and the quest for the philosopher's stone. He places Keynes (1883-1946) in a long history of scientific and intellectual tradition with the intention of retrieving him as a source of inspiration and illumination for the theory and practice of public policy. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Parson (policy analysis, U. of London) clears away the mechanistic and positivistic language and ideology that has surrounded the work of the British economist to find a social scientist and philosopher rooted in an alchemical fascination with the art of transmutation and the quest for the philosopher's stone. He places Keynes (1883-1946) in a long history of scientific and intellectual tradition with the intention of retrieving him as a source of inspiration and illumination for the theory and practice of public policy. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

In the current financial crisis Keynes has been taken out of his cupboard, dusted down, consulted, cited, invoked and appealed to about why events have taken the course they have and how a rescue operation can be effected. Why have we gone back so emphatically to the ideas of an economist who died fifty years ago? There are three main ideas of Keynes's worth thinking about now. The first is that the future is unknowable, and therefore that economic storms, especially those originating in the financial system, are not random shocks which impinge on smoothly-adjusting markets, but part of the normal working of the market system. The second idea is that economies wounded by these 'shocks' can, if left to themselves, stay in a depressed condition for a long time. That is why governments need to have and use fiscal ammunition to prevent a slide from financial crisis to economic depression. The third concerns what he termed 'organicism': societies are communities not, as he put it, 'branches of the multiplication table'. This limited his support for the pursuit of efficiency at all costs. The ideas of John Maynard Keynes have never been more timely.

Comprehensive and authoritative, this book, written by a recognized authority on the subject explores the contributions to modern economics by John Maynard Keynes and addresses neglected, yet crucial aspects of the genesis of Keynesian economics. In this book, the author elucidates Keynes’ development as an economic theoretician through an examination of his books, articles, various manuscripts, lecture notes and controversial correspondence. Departing from a narrative account and analyzing processes of theory-building and re-building which constitute Keynes’s intellectual journey from the Tract to the General Theory, this volume shows Keynes’ theoretical development as a theoretical hypothesis. An excellent exposition of Keynes’ contribution, this is a valuable addition to the bookshelves of all to students and researchers interested in Keynes and more widely the history of economic thought and macroeconomics.

This fascinating book is the first to bring together and examine all aspects of the life and work of one of the most influential thinkers of the last century, John Maynard Keynes, whose theses are still hotly debated. It combines, in an accessible, unique and cohesive manner, analytical, biographical and contextual elements from a variety of perspectives. Gilles Dostaler studies in detail the battles that Keynes led on various fronts - politics, philosophy, art, and of course economics - in the pursuit of a single and lifelong goal: to radically transform society to create a better world, a world pacified and freed from the neurotic pursuit of financial wealth and economic rentability, with art at its pinnacle. Containing detailed presentations of the Bloomsbury group and the political history of Great Britain, Keynes and his Battles is an essential reference to this most important of 20th century figures whose central message remains as topical today as it ever was. The study also contains a unique chronology of Keynes¿s life and historical events, portraits of Keynes by his friends and contemporaries, as well as a full bibliography of all his books, chapters contributed to books, journal articles and reviews. Scholars, students and researchers of economics - the history of economic thought in particular - political science, sociology, history, philosophy and the history of arts will find this an absorbing and revealing work. The book should also interest journalists, decision makers in society and all those who are preoccupied by the problems of our time.

Raadschelders and Fry provide a singular investigation into the influence of 10 scholars on contemporary public administration as well as how significant their work continues to be on contemporary research. In a field that is eclectic and pragmatic, it is only fitting that the diversity of the following scholars reflects the diversity of the field of public administration: Max Weber, Frederick W. Taylor, Luther H. Gulick, Mary Parker Follett, Elton Mayo, Chester Barnard, Herbert A. Simon, Charles E. Lindblom, Elinor Ostrom, and Dwight Waldo. The impacts of their personal life experiences on scholarly thought and their ideas about science and a science of public administration are used to enhance an examination of their ideas, concepts, and theories. The writings of such a wide-ranging group of scholars are also connected by a recognition of the growth and organizational independence of the field of public administration. For the Fourth Edition, a new perspective has been included: a review of Elinor Ostrom’s work provides valuable new material on organization and decision making that is applicable in many disciplines and across many fields. In addition, substantive updates to the scholarship and analysis found in each of the chapters in the book encourage new avenues for questions, insight, and exploration in the field of public administration.

Table of contents

This volume provocatively rethinks the economics, politics and sociology of money and examines the classic question of what is money. Starting from the two dominant views of money, as neutral instrument and as social relation, What is Money? presents a thematic, interdisciplinary approach which points to a definitive statement on money. Bringing together a variety of neclassical and heterodox perspectives, this work collects the latest thinking of some of the best-known economics scholars on the question of money. The contributors are Victoria Chick, Kevin Dowd, Gilles Dostaler, Steve Fleetwood, Gunnar Heinsohn, Geoff Ingham, Peter Kennedy, Peter G. Klein, Bernard Maris, Scott Meikle, Alain Parguez, Colin Rodgers, T.K.Rymes, Mario Seccarreccia, George Selgin, Otto Steiger, John Smithin and L. Randall Wray.