01/03/2024
A must Read for Those who are in International Cross Section of Political Economy!
Today got a New Member in my Rare Book Collection:100 years old book.
The Economic Causes of War
Author Bio:
Lionel Robbins
Lionel Charles Robbins (1898-1984) was one of the leading English economists of the twentieth century. His An Essay on the Nature and Significance of Economic Science (1932) is as an outstanding statement of the Misesian view of economic method; that is, namely, that economics is a social science and must advance its propositions by means of deductive reasoning and not through the methods used in the natural sciences. Robbins' The Great Depression (1934) brilliantly applies the Austrian theory of the business cycle to explain the depression—which, he notes, was of unprecedented severity.
Reference:
https://lnkd.in/dKttf9am
Review:
A masterpiece of sound analysis and clear exposition, by a professor of economics at the University of London. After criticizing (and discarding) the Marxian theory of imperialism, Professor Robbins tells what he regards as the true economic causes of war. He finds the anarchic political organization of the world to be the "root disease of our civilization," and concludes that national sovereignty in economic matters must be curbed and replaced by some sort of a federation.
Robbins authored book particularly at the intersection of War and Economic analysis further directs us to the very changing world order which is again having a ripple effect on multipolarism in Economic dialects which further keeps Hayekian Economic foundations at bay while exaggerating the effects of "Dollar Diplomacy" during 1930s era fused with Leninist theory of governance. The book is very futuristic and aptly relevant for todays increasing volatile political dynamics and advent of new defense parameters which is not relying solely on economic muscles but a rising new world order.
The Free market economic theory and Austrian Economic foundations which found a markedly sensation in the explanatory functionaries of the Nature of Economic transition and Nature of War is worth mentioning. The intricacies of War and How it can direct Economic considerations is indeed the foundation of the book.No less an economist than Professor Robbins has urged that the political economy of war is ‘a contradiction in terms’, apparently on the ground that, since Economics is concerned with the causes of material welfare and since war is not a cause of material welfare, war cannot be a part of the subject-matter of economics.
“Economists take a distinctive approach to the study of human behaviour, and they employ a mode of analysis based on certain presuppositions. For example, much of economic analysis starts with the general proposition that people prefer more to fewer of those things they value and that they seek to maximize their welfare by making, reasonable, consistent choices in the things they buy and sell”
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