Economic Theories in a Non-Walrasian Tradition

Negishi examines a broad range of topics in the history of economics that have relevance to current economic theories. The author contends that one of the tasks for historians of economics is to analyze and interpret theories currently outside the mainstream of economic theory, in this case, Walrasian economics. Familiar topics covered include the division of labor, economies of scale, wages, profit, international trade, market mechanisms, and money. These are considered in reference to the well-known non-Walrasian schools of thought.


This book covers a broad range of topics in the history of economics that have relevance to current economic theories. The author believes that one of the tasks for a historian of economics is to analyze and interpret theories currently outside the mainstream of economic theory, in this case non-Walrasian economics. By doing so, he argues, new directions and new areas for research can be developed that will extend the current theories. Familiar topics covered include: the division of labor, economies of scale, wages, profit, international trade, market mechanisms, and money. These are considered in the light of the well-known non-Walrasian schools of thought: the classical, Marxian, Austrian, and Cambridge schools.

Contents 
Preface; 1. Anti-neoclassical or non-Walrasian economic theories; Part I. Increasing Returns and Diminishing Cost: 2. Adam Smith and increasing returns in a competitive situation; 3. A reconstruction of Smith's doctrine on the natural order of investment; 4. The possibility of a falling rate of profit under diminishing cost; 5. Rehabilitation of Marshall's life-cycle theory to explain diminishing cost; Part II. Wages and Profit: 6. Conditions for the wages fund doctrine and Mill's recantation of it; 7. Marx and exploitationd in production and in circulation; 8. Marx's dichotomy between exploitation and redistribution of surplus products; 9. Böhm-Bawerk and the positive rate of interest in a stationary state; Part III. International Trade and Investment: 10. The role of exporters and importers in classical and Keynesian theories; 11. Ricardo, the natural wage, and international unequal exchange; Part IV. Markets and Money: 12. Jevons, Edgeworth, and the competitive equilibrium of exchange; 3. Menger's Absatz-fähigkeit, a non-Walrasian theory of markets and money; 4. The marshallian foundation of macroeconomic theories; Notes; References; Author index; Subject index.

Reviews 
‘ … a most impressive display of economic theory at its best.’ History of Political Economy

‘As a contribution to contemporary economic theory the volume is extremely successful; virtually every chapter contains something of interest.’ Journal of Economic Literature