BOOK REVIEW A HISTORY OF ECONOMIC THEORY AND ITS METHOD

Abstract

This textbook on economic thought, written by Auburn University professors Robert B. Ekelund Jr. and Robert F. Hébert, was used in the 1990s by Professor Pedro Schwartz in his economic thought classes at the Complutense University. It is a comprehensive and systematic textbook, offering a highly impartial treatment of authors and works. In general terms, it offers a modern perspective favourable to the market economy, although its critique of socialist economics, particularly of Marx, is more striking. It does not reach the levels of criticism found, for example, in Rothbard’s textbook, but, of course, its conception of a planned economy is by no means indifferent. As for the content, the work begins with Part One: Introduction and Origins, in which the first chapter on the method of economic science in general, and of economic thought in particular, is particularly noteworthy. Furthermore, all chapters provide a list of References at the end, rather than the dull and tedious bibliography typically found in academic works.