Political Economy in the Conservative Hour

James Ronald Stanfield and Jacqueline Bloom Stanfield

Chapter 7 in John Kenneth Galbraith, 2011, pp 175-199 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract In this chapter we first review Galbraith’ s analysis of the failure of economic thought and policy that paved the way for the Conservative Hour. Thereafter we turn our attention to The Anatomy of Power (1983a), The Culture of Contentment (1992a), and The Good Society (1996). The first is the most focused discussion of power that Galbraith provided. It offers a taxonomy and analysis of this fundamental force in the social system. The second presents Galbraith’ s view that a new socioeconomic class dynamic has arisen, that between the relatively affluent, who tend to be politically active, and the less advantaged, who are relatively inactive politically. A vanguard of sorts are the socially concerned who seek public policy measures aimed at supporting the disadvantaged, both domestically and transnationally. Galbraith musters some optimism about the force of historical circumstance but nothing like the optimism he earlier had ascribed to the scientific-intellectual estate (The Socially Concerned Today, 1998a, pp. 30–1). The socially concerned are the sizeable minority of the affluent whose political attitudes include looking ‘ beyond personal contentment to a concern for those who do not share the comparative well-being’ (Contentment, p. 17). The Good Society is a concise discussion of Galbraith’ s vision of the guiding principles for the socially concerned.

Keywords: Political Economy; Monetary Policy; Welfare State; Inner Core; Upward Mobility (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:gtechp:978-0-230-30244-0_7

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.palgrave.com/9780230302440

DOI: 10.1057/9780230302440_7

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Great Thinkers in Economics from Palgrave Macmillan
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().