Commentary

[in chronological order]

Schumpeter’s Heirs

– Rose, Gideon. "Schumpeter's Heirs." Foreign Affairs. January/February 2015.

Excerpt: The Austrian economist Joseph Schumpeter put entrepreneurs at the center of his model of capitalism. Innovation was crucial to dynamism and growth, he argued, and entrepreneurs were the ones who made innovation happen. The “new… More

What Exactly is an Entrepreneur?

– "What Exactly is an Entrepreneur?" The Economist. February 16, 2014.

Excerpt: Entrepreneurs are everybody’s favourite heroes. Politicians want to clone them. Popular television programmes such as “The Apprentice” and “Dragons’ Den” lionise them. School textbooks praise them. When the author… More

Schumpeter Got Innovation Wrong, and Other Myth-Busting Ideas from a Nobel Prize Economist

– Bowyer, Jerry and Edmund S. Phelps. "Schumpeter Got Innovation Wrong, and Other Myth-Busting Ideas from a Nobel Prize Economist." Forbes. January 20, 2014.

Excerpt: Edmund, Ned, Phelps certainly did not need to write Mass Flourishing: How Grassroots Innovation Created Jobs, Challenge, and Change to make a name for himself. His work on labor market economics was both solid and itself innovative enough to earn him… More

Joseph A. Schumpeter

– Medearis, John. Joseph A. Schumpeter. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2013.

From Amazon: Joseph Schumpeter (1883-1950) was one of the foremost economic thinkers of the twentieth century. Today Schumpeter is most well-known for his idea of “creative destruction.” This is the notion that a market economy is simultaneously… More

Joseph A. Schumpeter: Historian of Economics: Perspectives on the History of Economic Thought

– Moss, Laurence S. (ed.). Joseph A. Schumpeter: Historian of Economics: Perspectives on the History of Economic Thought. London: Routledge, 2013.

From Amazon: Joseph A. Schumpeter was one of the great economists of the twentieth century. His History of Economic Analysis is perhaps the greatest contribution to the history of economics, providing a magisterial account of the development of the subject… More

Schumpeter in the White House

– Sorman, Guy. "Schumpeter in the White House." City Journal. Spring 2012.

Excerpt: The 2012 presidential race will be, in part, a showdown between two different models of economic growth. President Barack Obama and his Democratic administration will defend the once-discredited and now-resurgent theory that government must act as… More

Keynes, Schumpeter and the Great Post-War Mistake

– Nasar, Sylvia. "Keynes, Schumpeter and the Great Post-War Mistake." Bloomberg. September 8, 2011.

Excerpt: In January 1919, as the Allied leaders met in Paris to hammer out a treaty ending World War I, famine and pestilence raged from St. Petersburg to Istanbul. To the Britons and Americans who came to survey the damage, the whole continent seemed to be… More

Schumpeter’s Moment

– Schramm, Carl. "Schumpeter's Moment." The Wall Street Journal Europe. May 29, 2009.

Excerpt: We continue to be in the middle of a frightening economic drama, one that is putting the core tenets of modern capitalism at the center of the global debate. That is an important debate to have, considering that the fundamental assumptions of modern… More

Joseph Schumpeter and the German Historical School

– Michaelides, Panayotis G. and John G. Milios. "Joseph Schumpeter and the German Historical School." Cambridge Journal of Economics. Vol. 33, No. 3. May 2009.

Abstract: So far Schumpeter’s affinities with the German Historical School (GHS) have been inadequately acknowledged or even unexplored in major accounts of Schumpeter’s work. This essay argues that Schumpeter’s principal theses are… More

Prophet of Innovation: Joseph Schumpeter and Creative Destruction

– McCraw, Thomas K. Prophet of Innovation: Joseph Schumpeter and Creative Destruction. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2007.

From The New Yorker: In 1939, the economist Joseph Schumpeter wrote that “the history of capitalism is studded with violent bursts and catastrophes” that, while ultimately bettering society, seem “like a series of explosions.” He… More

Mr. Creative Destruction

– Kosar, Kevin R. "Mr. Creative Destruction." The Weekly Standard. Vol. 12, No. 35. May 28, 2007. (Review of Prophet of Innovation: Joseph Schumpeter and Creative Destruction, by Thomas K. McCraw.)

Excerpt: Economics, Carlyle famously grumbled, is the “dismal science.” With few exceptions (Adam Smith, Milton Friedman), its practitioners are little known to non-economists, and frequently mocked. Who can forget what Lyndon Johnson once said to… More

Modernization and Its Political Consequences: Weber, Mannheim, and Schumpeter

– Blokland, Hans. Van Weesep, Nancy Smyth (trans.). Modernization and Its Political Consequences Weber, Mannheim, and Schumpeter. New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press, 2006.

Excerpt: Joseph Alois Schumpeter (1883–1950) is one of the greatest social scientists of the twentieth century. Only Max Weber and his renowned rival John Maynard Keynes might compete with him. At least, this is opinion of the Harvard economist Gottfried… More

The Father of Creative Destruction

– Rose, Frank. "The Father of Creative Destruction." Wired. March 2002.

Excerpt: Adam Smith, make room: Joseph Schumpeter has come to Washington. Capital policy wonks may not yet be wearing Schumpeter ties, but the Harvard economist’s ideas are cited by everyone from Federal Reserve chief Alan Greenspan to the warring… More

Joseph Schumpeter’s Two Theories of Democracy

– Medearis, John. Joseph Schumpeter's Two Theories of Democracy. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2001.

From Harvard University Press: This book offers the first full-length treatment of Joseph Schumpeter’s political thought. Schumpeter’s theory of democracy as a competition among elites has influenced several generations of political scientists, but this… More

Capitalism, Socialism, and Irony: Understanding Schumpeter in Context

– Muller, Jerry Z. "Capitalism, Socialism, and Irony: Understanding Schumpeter in Context." Critical Review. Vol. 13, Iss. 3-4. 1999.

Abstract: The significance of the major claims of Joseph Schumpeter’s best‐known work, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, have often been misunderstood by readers unattuned to its ironic mode of presentation. The book reaffirms two themes that were… More

The Place of Human Action in the Development of Modern Economic Thought

– Salerno, Joseph T. "The Place of Human Action in the Development of Modern Economic Thought." The Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics. Vol. 2, No. 1. Spring 1999, 35-66.

Excerpt: The core of any system of economic theory is the explanation of how prices are determined. As Mises (1998, p. 235) himself put it, “Economics is mainly concerned with the analysis of the determination of money prices of goods and services… More

Schumpeter, the New Deal, and Democracy

– Medearis, John. "Schumpeter, the New Deal, and Democracy." The American Political Science Review. Vol. 91, No. 4. December 1997, 819-832.

Abstract: Joseph Schumpeter is known to American political scientists as the originator of an elite conception of democracy as a political “method,” a conception found in his Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy (1942). But I show in this paper… More

The Limited Rationality of Democracy: Schumpeter as the Founder of Irrational Choice Theory

– Prisching, Manfred. "The Limited Rationality of Democracy: Schumpeter as the Founder of Irrational Choice Theory." Critical Review. Vol. 9, Iss. 3. 1995, 301-324.

Abstract: Joseph Schumpeter’s work has been all too selectively appropriated by public choice theorists. Schumpeter criticized the high level of rationality the classical model of democracy imputes to citizens, and he provided an alternative theory,… More

Joseph A. Schumpeter and The Theory of Democracy

– Elliott, John E. "Joseph A. Schumpeter and The Theory of Democracy." Review of Social Economy. Vol. 52, No. 4. Winter 1994, 280-300.

Schumpeter: A Biography

– Swedberg, Richard. Schumpeter: A Biography. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1992.

From Amazon: This widely admired intellectual biography of Joseph Schumpeter (1883-1950) follows his career from his immensely creative and productive youth in Austria-Hungary to the strange depressions that plagued him during his later years and to his… More

His Secret Life

– Heilbroner, Robert L. "His Secret Life." The New York Review of Books. May 14, 1992. (Review of Opening Doors: The Life and Work of Joseph Schumpeter Volume 1: Europe Volume 2: America, by Robert Loring Allen and Schumpeter: A Biography, by Richard Swedberg.)

Excerpt: My serious studies in economics did not begin until the fall of 1939, my last year at Harvard, when I took a course with Alvin Hansen in which we wrestled with the problem of understanding the incomprehensible Depression that had been devastating the… More

Schumpeter’s Curious Politics

– Semmel, Bernard. "Schumpeter’s Curious Politics." The Public Interest. Iss. 106. Winter 1992.

Excerpt: The Austro-German economist and social theorist Joseph A. Schumpeter, who in the 1930s became professor of economics at Harvard and a U.S. citizen, has often been described as John Maynard Keynes’s principal rival for the title of greatest… More

Schumpeter Ascending

– McCraw, Thomas K. "Schumpeter Ascending." The American Scholar. Vol. 60, No. 3. Summer 1991, 371-392.

Abstract: Profiles Joseph Schumpeter, Harvard economist and contemporary of John Maynard Keynes. Born in 1883 in Triesch, Moravia and educated in Europe; His arrival at Harvard in the early 1930s; His views on the New Deal and what it implied about the… More

Opening Doors: The Life and Work of Joseph Schumpeter: America (Volume 2)

– Allen, Robert Loring. Opening Doors: the Life and Work of Joseph Schumpeter: America (Volume 2). New Brunswick, New Jersey: Transaction, 1991.

From Amazon: The author puts this book in the best possible context by referring to the “magisterial and paradoxical Dr. Schumpeter.” A figure in a rare class with John Maynard Keynes, Friedrich von Hayek, and Alfred Marshall, the work of Joseph… More

Opening Doors: The Life and Work of Joseph Schumpeter: Europe (Volume 1)

– Allen, Robert Loring. Opening Doors: the Life and Work of Joseph Schumpeter: Europe (Volume 1). New Brunswick, New Jersey: Transaction, 1991.

Breaking Out of the Walrasian Box: The Cases of Schumpeter and Hansen

– Rothbard, Murray N. "Breaking Out of the Walrasian Box: The Cases of Schumpeter and Hansen." The Review of Austrian Economics. Spring 1987.

Excerpt: Since World War II, mainstream neoclassical economics has followed the general equilibrium paradigm of Swiss economist Leon Walras (1834-1910). Economic analysis now consists of the exegesis and elaboration of the Walrasian concept of general… More

Joseph Schumpeter