Utopian Economists

...It was only in the United States that the capitalist economy assumed a character differing essentially from the Marxian construction, and, in fact, Marx's prophecies of doom were not fulfilled in the United States...

...contributor to "Partisan Review" "Commentary" This book deals with the development of economic thought since Adam Smith from a very original standpoint...

...Heilbroner finally rejects...

...It is a drama with a "thread of continuity," a human drama rather than a purely intellectual-enterprise...

...and, second, the fact that the market mechanism leads to an ever greater division of labor and, hence, to ever greater productivity...

...This seemed to be guaranteed by two things: first, the fact that, under the conditions of the market, every individual merely has to seek his own advantage in order to bring about those conditions which will be most beneficial for all others...

...Heilbroner sees it, is one from exuberant hope to fear or resignation...

...For these, the author has nothing but contempt...

...The author's conclusion is, roughly speaking, that European capitalism indeed conformed to Marx's prophecies...

...The author sees this very clearly: he obviously expects no salvation from the sudden overthrow of our present economic institutions, imperfect as they are...

...his other basic prophecy, that of "Verelendung," the growing pauperization of the masses, was fulfilled neither here nor there...

...Yet, the organization of the material that goes before reveals an undue fascination with the visionary approach which Mr...

...But dabbling in huge perspectives can also do much mischief...

...All the revisionists, beginning with Ricardo, have one thing in common: They see limits which the market mechanism must necessarily encounter in the process of its dynamic growth, at which point the mechanism will have to grind to a stop or be thrown out of gear...

...This, at least, is the picture we get from Mr...

...Some saw these limits in the finiteness of food resources, others in some law of diminishing returns...

...Heilbroner's book is not a balanced and comprehensive survey of the main ideas contributed by economists to the understanding of the world during the last two hundred years, but it is a vivid and remarkably well integrated presentation of one branch of economic thought: the adventurous, prophetic, emotional and heterodox one...

...The revolutionary and literally world-shaking effects of this transformation have gradually unfolded since that time, and economics in the author's sense represents man's renewed efforts to understand the meaning of this drama, foretell its course, and come to terms with it...

...One or another of these emotions was dominant, depending on whether the evolution of the market system seemed to produce misery or prosperity...

...Heilbroner's book...

...and the characteristic sequence in the drama of economic thought, as Mr...

...The author may well be right in feeling that, all told, this branch is more important than the orthodox, technical and academic tradition of Western economics...

...1 felt, in particular, that the chapter on Marx, though readable, lucid and accurate in many respects, exaggerated the extent to which Marx had grasped the long-range trend of capitalist development...

...Some of Marx's prophecies, particularly the one concerning the trend toward concentration of capital, were fulfilled to a greater extent in America than in Europe...

...What he stands for is the supplementing of the market mechanism by various corrective mechanisms, not their replacement by an integral socialism claiming to achieve the millennium...

...much of academic economics indeed became an abstract intellectual exercise for its own sake, with a regrettable tendency to ignore unpleasant facts...

...All the things he predicted would come to pass under capitalism did come to pass in Europe, and essentially for the reasons he adduced...

...Now it is true that Marx, or rather his disciples, did forecast wars as the allegedly necessary, and catastrophic, concomitants of the system itself...

...In this survey of the history of economic thought, he neglects one stream of tradition—that of "classic" equilibrium theory—almost complete...

...Essentially, all the "worldly philosophers" with whom the author deals after Smith discover something radically wrong with the market system, some inner flaw which frustrates the working of the beneficial mechanism set forth by Adam Smith...

...But this task cannot be performed responsibly if capitalism is contrasted with an antithetical system of the future that will have no "inner contradictions" and limitations whatever...

...Did they produce any large vistas, telling us where the trend of evolution will carry us...

...Everybody has a place in his system —the early geniuses, the dreamers, the cranks, the revolutionaries, the innovators, the outsiders—everybody, that is, except normal academic scholars...

...There is, it seems to me, some justification for this attitude...

...The era of the market began on a note of hope and then went on to play increasingly agonized variations on the theme of anxiety...

...To Adam Smith and his generation, it seemed that at last a principle of the ordering of human affairs had been discovered that would produce happiness automatically, since it relied only on selfish motives—which, of course, could never fail...

...It was, to be sure, essential to develop some theory of the long-range prospects and limitations of the dynamic market economy...

...The initial vision was full of sturdy hope...

...Adam Smith, who gave the first comprehensive account of the inner mechanism of the market system, saw in it primarily the promise of progress toward a more and more abundant life...

...These conclusions are presented in his final chapter, "Beyond the Economic Revolution...

...What problem did they solve, except minute questions of detail, relevant only to the shortest of short-term perspectives...

...and when the world wars came, this was said to be a vindication of Marxist theory...

...The downfall of European capitalism came about through war, and not through causes inherent in the functioning of the capitalist system as such...

...Actually, however, I think the Marxist analysts of our age as an "imperialist" and warlike one were right for the wrong reasons: The wars did not break out for the essentially economic reasons of which the Marxists had written...

...It is, rather, man's response to something unprecedented, drastic and fateful that happened to him about the middle of the eighteenth century: the emergence of the market economy, which was to transform completely man's social environment...

...In the author's presentation, the real stuff of economic thinking is hope, fear, resignation, indignation...

...The European bourgeoisie was the kind of ruling class Marx had in mind when he spoke of the bourgeoisie, and met the fate that Marx had predicted for it...

...Both Eastern and Western European society differed from American society, but emphatically not in the sense that the former corresponded more closely to the Marxian concept of the bourgeoisie than the latter...

...as time passed, the criticisms became more and more shrill and apocalyptic, until Marx challenged the very principle of the market economy as contrary to the real nature of man...

...Heilbroner, consists of revisions of this hopeful original blueprint...

...For the author, the essential part of economic thought is not abstract theory, and not even the factual explanation of observable economic phenomena...

...The subsequent history of economic thought, as presented by Mr...

...All this seems to me historically wrong...

...they are sane and reasonable...