This book examines the life and work of John Kenneth Galbraith, a truly iconic figure in progressive modern liberalism and a seminal influence in the rise of heterodox political economy. It emphasizes his continuing relevance to the current research of today, and to the multifaceted crisis of democratic capitalism.

This is a study of the need for an economics that addresses social provisioning in the context of power and culture. The author argues that such an approach is necessary to the development of an analysis that treats human wants and technology as endogenous variables, thereby avoiding the atavism inherent in conventional economics epistemology. Only in this way can the requisite re-viewing of the place of economy in society be brought to bear in an economic analysis capable of addressing the seemingly intractable problems of the democratic capitalist societies.

This is an intellectual portrait of John Kenneth Galbraith, an institutional economist who examines the configuration of power by the clusters of mores that comprise institutions. Galbraith proposes an aggressive social democratic policy to achieve social and economic reform. This policy includes explicit recognition that the state must intervene to countervail the power of entrenched political economic interests, and to provide generous support for the arts and letters to achieve the affirmation of humanity.

The democratic industrial societies face a deeply-rooted institutional crisis. The accepted ways and means of living lead to frustration and anxiety rather than creativity and joy. The roots of this crisis are political and economic. These societies contain economies that pervert and obstruct the human life process and polities that are subordinate to economic vested interests. Karl Polanyi was a Hungarian emigr ho witnessed first hand the cataclysms to which this political economic crisis can lead. He created a powerful social economic theory to analyze this institutional impasse and lay the foundation for social reconstruction. This book reviews Polanyi's life and work, his contributions to the methodology of economics, his concepts of social integration, his theory of market capitalism, and his view of freedom in complex industrial societies.

This book provides an intellectual portrait of John Kenneth Galbraith, an institutional economist who examines the configuration of power by the clusters of mores that comprise institutions. Galbraith proposes an aggressive social democratic policy to achieve social and economic reform. This policy includes explicit recognition that the state must intervene to countervail the power of entrenched political economic interests and to provide generous support of the arts and letters to achieve the affirmation of humanity.

This book depicts the need for an economics that addresses social provisioning in the context of power and culture. Such an approach is necessary to the development of an analysis that treats human wants and technology as endogenous variables, thereby avoiding the atavism inherent in conventional economics epistemology. Only in this way can the requisite re-viewing of the place of economy in society be brought to bear in an economic analysis capable of addressing the seemingly intractable problems of the democratic capitalist societies.

The democratic industrial societies face a deeply-rooted institutional crisis. The accepted ways and means of living lead to frustration and anxiety rather than creativity and joy. The roots of this crisis are political and economic. These societies contain economies that pervert and obstruct the human life process and polities that are subordinate to economic vested interests. Karl Polanyi was a Hungarian emigr ho witnessed first hand the cataclysms to which this political economic crisis can lead. He created a powerful social economic theory to analyze this institutional impasse and lay the foundation for social reconstruction. This book reviews Polanyi's life and work, his contributions to the methodology of economics, his concepts of social integration, his theory of market capitalism, and his view of freedom in complex industrial societies.

For over half a century, Canadian-born John Kenneth Galbraith (b. 1908) has been among the most visible of public intellectuals. His articulate and controversial best-selling books-including "The Affluent Society," "Economics and the Public Purpose," and "The New Industrial State"-and his very partisan liberal Democrat political and public service activities secured a place for him among the rich and famous of his time.

He worked as an adviser to President John F. Kennedy, served as U.S. ambassador to India (1961-1963), and edited "Fortune" magazine during the mid-1940s. Among American economists of any era, he is rivaled only by Thorstein Veblen for the introduction of phrases that take on a life of their own in the literate idiom. Such Galbraithian phrases as "the conventional wisdom" and the "affluent society" have become familiar even beyond Galbraith's remarkably wide readership. No other economist of the twentieth century, excepting perhaps John Maynard Keynes, can claim so secure a place in the belles-lettres of the English-speaking world.

This collection of interviews documents the long career of an influential economist and political philosopher who has spent much of his professional life in the public eye. Many of the interviews are occasioned by publication of his books and contain their key themes such as the importance of Keynes, the need to include power in economic thinking, and the neglected priorities of aesthetics, poverty, and the environment in affluent America. The interviews also indicate Galbraith's wide-ranging public service and his frequent hobnobbing with the political and intellectual elite. Through the collection, which spans over four decades, Galbraith's erudition, wit, and impassioned liberalism shine through, making this volume an essential companion to his works.