No Wealth but Life
Welfare Economics and the Welfare State in Britain, 1880–1945

This book re-examines early twentieth-century British welfare economics in the context of the emergence of the welfare state.

Roger E. Backhouse (Edited by), Tamotsu Nishizawa (Edited by)

9780521197861, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 22 March 2010

256 pages
23.5 x 15.9 x 1.9 cm, 0.48 kg

'The papers in No Wealth but Life provide a wide-ranging historical and philosophical discussion of welfare economics during the period when the British welfare state was being established. The book is a very important contribution to the literature on this underexamined topic in the history of economics and public policy.' D. Wade Hands, University of Puget Sound

This book re-examines early twentieth-century British welfare economics in the context of the emergence of the welfare state. There are fresh views of the well-known Cambridge School of Sidgwick, Marshall, Pigou, and Keynes, by Peter Groenewegen, Steven G. Medema, and Martin Daunton. This is placed against a less well-known Oxford approach to welfare: Yuichi Shionoya explores its foundations in the idealist philosophy of T. H. Green; Roger E. Backhouse considers the work of its leading exponent, J. A. Hobson; and Tamotsu Nishizawa discusses the spread of this approach in Britain. Finally, the book covers welfare economics in the policy arena: Maria Cristina Marcuzzo and Atsushi Komine discuss Keynes and Beveridge, and Richard Toye points to the possible influence of H. G. Wells on Churchill and Lloyd George. A substantial introduction frames the discussion, and a postscript relates these ideas to the work of Robbins and subsequent developments in welfare economics.

1. Introduction: towards a reinterpretation of the history of welfare economics Roger E. Backhouse and Tamotsu Nishizawa
Part I. Cambridge Welfare Economics and the Welfare State: 2. Marshall on welfare economics and the welfare state Peter Groenewegen
3. Pigou's 'prima facie case': market failure in theory and practice Steven G. Medema
4. Welfare, taxation and social justice: reflections on Cambridge economists from Marshall to Keynes Martin Daunton
Part II. Oxford Ethics and the Problem of Welfare: 5. The Oxford approach to the philosophical foundations of the welfare state Yuichi Shionoya
6. J. A. Hobson as a welfare economist Roger E. Backhouse
7. The ethico-historical approach abroad: the case of Fukuda Tamotsu Nishizawa
Part III. Welfare Economics in the Policy Arena: 8. 'The great educator of unlikely people': H. G. Wells and the origins of the welfare state Richard Toye
9. Whose welfare state? Beveridge versus Keynes Maria Cristina Marcuzzo
10. Beveridge on a welfare society: an integration of his trilogy Atsushi Komine
Part IV. Postscript: 11. Welfare economics, old and new Roger E. Backhouse and Tamotsu Nishizawa.

Subject Areas: Economic history [KCZ], Political economy [KCP], Sociology [JHB], 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000 [HBLW]