------------ EH.NET BOOK REVIEW --------------
Published by EH.NET (January 2006)
Gianni Vaggi and Peter Groenewegen, _A Concise History of Economic
Thought: From Mercantilism to Monetarism_. New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2003. xvi + 339 pp. $105 (cloth), ISBN: 0-333-99936-3.
Reviewed for EH.NET by David Andrews, Department of Economics, SUNY-Oswego.
Two distinguished historians of economics, Gianni Vaggi of the
University of Pavia and Peter Groenewegen of the University of
Sydney, have collaborated on a new textbook, _A Concise History of
Economic Thought: From Mercantilism to Monetarism_. The book is
distinctive in its length and structure. The book, which including
the bibliography and index has fewer than 350 pages, consists of 43
discrete accounts of individual economic authors included in 34
chapters divided between "Classical Political Economy" and "Modern
Developments." The accounts include basic biographical information
and additional readings, so the descriptions of the ideas of each
author are quite brief, often just a few pages. This brevity is
achieved by narrowing attention to a few topics with which each
author is "generally associated" (p. 4).
Despite the use of vignettes centered on individuals, the book points
out many connections among thinkers and tells a coherent story of the
development of the history of economics. It begins with the
mercantilists, who contributed by establishing the wealth of nations
as an object of investigation and by provoking critics who became
proto-classicals. Physiocrats and others discovered or constructed
the central concepts of classical political economy, including
division of labor, capital, surplus and reproduction. Adam Smith put
the pieces together into a general theory, which was refined by David
Ricardo and found its final expression in Karl Marx.
The story then shifts directions as the authors argue that the
Marginal Revolution involved a sharp discontinuity between Classical
and Modern economics. The authors understand this discontinuity as a
shift in emphasis rather than a movement from the incorrect to the
correct or from the correct to the incorrect. They maintain that both
classical and modern economics are important for understanding the
economy today. The story of modern economics treats micro and macro
separately. The micro story begins with the appearance of the
marginal principle in exchange in the 1870s, with Jevons, Menger and
Walras, continues with the development of the marginal productivity
theory of distribution, and concludes with the controversies and
complications in the 1920s and 1930s concerning costs and
competition. The macro side of the story begins with pre-Keynesian
monetary theory, continues with Keynes and Keynesian developments and
concludes with Milton Friedman and monetarism.
Any textbook on the history of economic thought must be selective to
some degree, but since this book is explicitly concerned to be
concise, the problem of selection is particularly severe. The main
criterion for the inclusion of an economic writer appears to be
whether or not the writer plays a role in the authors' overarching
story of the (discontinuous) development of the history of economic
thought. So, for example, the Institutionalists do not fit neatly
into the story and are therefore excluded. Thorstein Veblen is
mentioned only in passing and John R. Commons not at all. Similarly,
there is no discussion of Friedrich Hayek, Ludwig von Mises, or
Austrians after Bohm-Bawerk. On the other hand, there are full
chapters on arguably lesser figures who do fit into the story such as
Pierre le Pesant Sieur de Boisguilbert and Richard Cantillon, and
sections of chapters on Dudley North, Fernando Galiani, Jean-Charles
Simonde de Sismondi, Robert Torrens, Nassau Senior and J.H. Clapham.
The requirements of the overarching story also appear to have led to
some peculiarities, such as including John Stuart Mill in the section
on the marginal revolution and locating Joseph Schumpeter among the
pioneers of macroeconomics for his work on economic development. The
range of authors covered is otherwise conventional.
The major advantage of this book is the ease with which readers can
get an introduction to the ideas of important figures in the history
of economic thought. The individual vignettes are of uniformly high
quality. They display a vast knowledge of the history of economic
thought, as might be expected from such accomplished authors. By
contrast with many textbooks, the writing is also impressively clear
and to the point. The judgments of which ideas are "generally
associated" with each author are standard. Although it is not
difficult to quibble over a number of points of interpretation, the
same might be said of any other textbook in the history of economic
thought. Marxists and post-Keynesians may be disappointed with the
treatments of Marx and Keynes, but, again, this is likely to be true
of any textbook.
The major disadvantages of this book all stem from the attempt to
achieve the brevity and clarity that are the book's strengths: the
limited range of thinkers covered, the limited context within which
each thinker is considered, and the relative neglect of historical
contexts. (The authors do make some effort to highlight the
historical context of the various authors, but this is extremely
difficult given the brevity of each account.)
I believe this book will prove a very useful resource for teaching,
as long as it is understood that the textbook will have to be
supplemented with lectures and readings that provide the broader
contexts. The additional readings at the end of each chapter are
useful in this regard.
It should be noted that there is a certain amount of sloppiness in
the book. There are a number of typographical errors and
misspellings. This is particularly unfortunate in a book designed for
students. Piero Sraffa seems to have fared the worst in this regard,
appearing as Scraffa in the table of contents and Saraffa in the
bibliography.
David Andrews' publications include "Keynes, Ricardo and the
Classical Theory of Interest," _European Journal of the History of
Economic Thought_ (2000).
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Published by EH.Net (January 2006). All EH.Net reviews are archived
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