Subjects
The Economic Writings of William Thornton
Editors: Philip Mirowski and Steven Tradewell
978 1 85196 388 1: 234x156mm: £450.00/$795.00
The writings of William Thornton (1813-1880) are central to the history of the laws of supply and demand and seminal in understanding the rise of neoclassical economics. Until recently, William Thornton has been cast by historians as a minor player in John Stuart Mill’s recantation of the wages fund doctrine. This significant event is discussed by Schumpeter in A History of Economic Analysis and Samuel Hollander in The Economics of John Stuart Mill.
Indeed, Thornton was a close personal friend of and associate of Mill’s for many years, However, it would be wrong to suggest that Thornton can only be seen as a lesser Mill, backing up the latter’s philosophies and with no coherent influence of his own. From 1847 until his death in 1880, Thornton was an active member of the Political Economy Club. This was a monthly conclave of individual scholars and and business people founded by David Ricardo and sustained by his followers to address the major issues affecting the new science of political economy.
Modern economists looking for precursors in historical texts will find interesting material. One recent example is T Negishi’s invocation of Thornton as a pioneer of disequilibrium theory. Others include experimental economists studying the importance of different market institutions on price determination, scholars concerned with the problem of path dependence as well as some Austrian economists interested in Thornton’s ideas about competition.
This new edition shows that in fact Thornton played a greater part in the history of economic thought. His first edition of On Labour was a blistering critique of the laws of supply and demand and served to mobilise the major players in the burgeoning neo-classical movement - Jevons, Edgeworth, Jenkin and Marshall - to reply with mathematical responses to the debate.
Contents
Volume 1:
Letters to The Economist concerning Thornton:
John Eliot Cairnes, ‘The "Law" of Demand and Supply’(October 1866);‘The "Law" of Demand and Supply’ (November 1866); Thomas Cliffe Leslie, ‘Demand and Supply’ (1866); William Thornton, ‘Supply and Demand’ (1866)
Thornton’s Works:
On the Income Tax (1862); England and Ireland (1868); Technical Education in England (1871); John Stuart Mill: His Career in the India House (1873); The Economic Definition of Wealth (1875); Professor Cairnes on Value (1876); The Wages Fund (1879); Parliament without Parties (1880); A New View of the Indian Exchange Difficulty (1880); To John Stuart Mill, Esq., In Imitation of an Epistle of Horace to Maecenas (1854); Zohràb; or, A Midsummer Day’s Dream and Other Poems (1854)
Volume 2
Overpopulation and its Remedy (1846)
Volume 3: A Plea for Peasant Proprietors (1848)
Thornton’s second book, this text elucidates Mill’s views of the plight of the Irish peasantry. It can be argued that Ireland is still to recover from the disastrous potato famine of the 1840s even 150 years later. Over more than 250 densely-packed pages, Thornton attempts to offer a practical solution to one of history’s biggest calamities; advice that was for the most part sadly unheeded. The writings of William Thornton are of tremendous interest to scholars of John Stuart Mill. As a close friend and associate for many years, the writings of Thornton help illustrate many of Mill’s positions on social issues. As well as this, modern economists looking for precursors in historical texts will find much interesting material. One recent example is Takashi Negishi’s invocation of Thornton as proto-disequilibrium theorist. Others include experimental economists studying the importance of different market institutions on price determination, scholars worried about the problems of ‘path-dependence’, as well as some Austrian economists interested in Thornton’s ideas about competition.
Volume 4
On Labour (1869); Ethics and Common Sense Metaphysics (1873); Indian Public Works (1875)
Reviews
‘This new collection is important for assessing the place of Thornton in the history of economic and social thought, and we should be grateful for the efforts of the editors and publishers.’
– Robert B Ekelund and Mark Thornton, Journal of the History of Economic Thought