By Karen I. Vaughn
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Number Of Pages: 212
Publication Date: 1994-05-27
ISBN-10 / ASIN: 0521445523
ISBN-13 / EAN: 9780521445528
Product Description:
This book examines the development of the ideas of the new Austrian school from its beginnings in Vienna in the 1870s to the present. It focuses primarily on showing how the coherent theme that emerges from the thought of Carl Menger, Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek, Ludwig Lachmann, Israel Kirzner and a variety of new younger Austrians is an examination of the implications of time and ignorance (or processes and knowledge) for economic theory.
Summary: The Definitive History of the Austrian School
Rating: 5
This excellent book documents in succinct but engaging style the origin and history of the Austrian school of economics from a distinctly Lachmannian point of view. My exposure to Austrian economics began with the work of Murray Rothbard, and from there moved on to Mises and then Kirzner. Predictably, my subsequent reading of both the Austrian and neoclassical literature has always been interpreted through the traditional (conventional) Austrian lense. source from www.booko.org
This book put everything in persepective for me. Karen Vaughn argues that Austrians agree on fundamentals, but disagree on their interpretation, emphasis, and applicaiton. Features such as subjectivism, time, ignorance, knowledge and human action figure prominently in every Austrian work. However, the way in which these subjects come to be treated differ radically in nearly every Austrian account of the economic process. In fact, she argues that the work of many Austrians represent a significant (and unfortunate) departure from the work of the school's founder, Carl Menger. The themes of ignorace, time and processes are lost in the clean, equilibrating, and unproblematic mechanisms of laissez-faire as it has come to be expounded by both Mises and Rothbard. Additionally, the pioneering work on entrepreneurship by Israel Kirzner is also symptomatic of the unavoidable tendency to abstract from time and ignorance in order to construct or articulate an orderly and well-functioning market process.
Throughout the book, the author continually hints at a possible (viable) alternative economic paradigm. The best source to draw inspiration from, the author argues, can be found in the writings of Ludwig Lachmann (the quintessential radical subjectivist). However, hints are really all we get in the book. Her extended treatment of Lachmann only really occurs in the second to last chapter, and even there the reader is left wanting more. But the author's ability to use Lachmannian insights to critique the work of other Austrians (Mises, Rothbard, Kirzner) is fascinating, and worth the price of the book alone. But in the end, her defense of this position is never really developed in the book. Interestingly, however, she does not see this as a sign of failure or cause for despair. Staying true to the notions of time and ignorance, she argues that the very recognition of these concepts "plays havoc with any theory of self-ordering market processes" (p.161).
The Austrian "genealogy" pursued and defended in this book clearly is with Menger --> Hayek --> and Lachmann. Anyone interested in Austrian economics is seriously advised to read this fascinating historical account of its development and migration to America.
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Summary: Helping to Better Understand the World as We Know It
Rating: 5
My introduction to the Austrian School of Economics came with a chance encounter of a publication from the Institute of Economic Affairs of London. This one monograph helped me to discover more of their particular publications and other similar books and pamphlets at the Laissez Faire Bookshop where one could often overhear at the very least some strenuous debates about economics and politics etc. My real academic introduction came with a paper by Peter Wynarczyck presented at a Newcastle upon Tyne Polytechnic Conference which drew together some of the historic strands of the school and some of the controversial ideas which it had generated.
I came back to Karen Vaughn's book while preparing another review for Amazon although in a slightly different field and, from the point of view of an educated layman, I have to say that I find this particular volume to be an excellent and succint piece of work but which perhaps at the time of writing requires a new edition. welcome to booko.org
I do not claim to be au fait with all of the various controversies within the Austrian School but I understand that there are some dogmatic fissures between certain groups some of whom claim that there's alone is the one true faith and who resist criticism especially from outside the academic arena.
My purpose in this brief review is to highlight what I believe is to be one of the best introductions to this particular field that I have read which is generally accessible to anyone with a reasonable grasp of economic and political ideas and who is at least a little sceptical of the current state of neoclassical economic theory. For readers who would like to sample the Austrian tradition without delving into a book of this size I would heartily recommend Stephen Littlechild's 'Fallacy of the Mixed Economy' even though it too is showing it's age.