Capitalist Development in the Twentieth Century
An Evolutionary-Keynesian Analysis

This 2001 book considers the macroeconomic record of developed capitalist economies over the past 100 years.

John Cornwall (Author), Wendy Cornwall (Author)

9780521341493, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 12 July 2001

304 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.7 cm, 0.617 kg

'The authors are to be congratulated for crafting a highly readable volume that combines a compelling account of recent capitalist history with contributions to the methods of evolutionary and Keynesian analyses. This book is essential reading for all who are interested in capitalist development and in the methods and application of non-mainstream macroeconomics.' Journal of Economic Issues

Capitalism in the twentieth century was marked by periods of persistent bad performance alternating with episodes of good performance. A lot of economic research ignores this phenomenon; other work concentrates almost exclusively on developing technology as its cause. This 2001 book draws upon Schumpeterian, Institutional and Keynesian economics to investigate how far these swings in performance can be explained as integral to capitalist development. The authors consider the macroeconomic record of the developed capitalist economies over the past 100 years (including rates of growth, inflation and unemployment) as well as the interaction of economic variables with the changing structural features of the economy in the course of industrialization and transformation. This approach allows for changes both in the economic structure and in the economic variables to be generated within the system. This study will be essential reading for macroeconomists and economic historians.

List of figures
List of tables
Foreword David Colander
Preface
Part I. Framework: 1. Economic development and economic performance
2. The stylized facts
3. The neoclassical analysis of unemployment
4. An extended Keynesian model
5. Institutions and power
6. Evolutionary and hysteretic processes
7. Theories of capitalist development
Part II. Explaining the Development Record: 8. Understanding the Great Depression
9. Foundations of the golden age
10. The golden age
11. Unemployment
Part III. Political Control of the Economy: 12. Unemployment and the distribution of power
13. A neoliberal future?
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Economic history [KCZ], Development economics & emerging economies [KCM], International economics [KCL], Macroeconomics [KCB]