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    8 views16 pages

    Keynes

    Uploaded by

    Mira Landesman

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
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    of 16
    ESSAYS IN PERSUASION JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES [bs Noro Parraack ‘Eu ie Poraaony Joa Maya Kejoes hel ife Jbe Mayr Kaya by Roy Hato W:W- NORTON & COMPANY ‘New York London WW Neon & Company ine, 500 Fith enue, New Yor, NY 1010 \W.W Naten& Company Lis, 57 Gest Asset Set, Loraon WOTB INU Fie published in the Norton Library 2963 Books That Live ‘The Nostoa imprint on «Book means that inthe publishers ‘estimation itis book not Fora single season bu ot the yeas. 'W. W, Norton & Company, lnc. ISBN 0-393-00290-3 PREFACE Hine are collected the croakings of twelve years —the croakings of a Cassandra who could never influence the course of events in time. The volume might have been entitled “Essays in Prophecy and Persuasion,” for the Prophecy un- fortunately, has been more successful than the Persuasion, But it was in a spirit of persuasion that most of these essays were written, in an attempt afuence opinion, They were ce garded at the time, many of them, as extreme nd reckless utterances. But I think that the reader, looking through them to-day, will admit that this was because they often ran disectly counter to the overwhelming weight of con- temporary sentiment and opinion, and not be- sepa icichanccrinthemlies, On the contrary, 1 feel—reading them again, though T fam a prejudiced witness—that they contain more understatement than overstatement, 2s judged by after-events. That this should be their tendency, is a natural consequence of the ‘circumstances in which they were written. For | =o poutries wo State ought sa ake upon itsel-to direct by the rere so as ile intererence 35 POs peste” Gestion.” We bave to discriminate between wf what Bentham, in his forgotten but useful Tne ied to term dnd an Non aa Go do this withowe Bentham’ prior caress te that inevetence ay at the Same Rreemyptcenlly needless” and "generally per wrest Perhaps the chet tsk of Econo | sae this hour fs to distinguish afresh the i see SGP Government from the Non dgen i | EE ee Pe of Police & Orde activites, | There is no “compact” conferring Be of Government within a Democracy perpetual rights on those who Have or on thove Whice'shul be, capable of accomplishing the Sho Acquire. ‘The world fs mor s0 governed wean Tac laste wha | hve in ind from above that private and socal’ merest (ee les always covcies Ue i ser so mmamgel hee G1 Relicke that in many cass the idea size below that in practice they coincide. Iv is nora for the unit of control and organisation Ties or spitect deduetion fom the Frinciples of Eeo- | somewhere between the individual and the nomics that enlightened self-interest always 1 modern State. I suggest, therefore, that pro- diged operates te publ ites -Nor ire ss sox and the recognition of an erally. isealighueands more | Ses ne aries within the Sate— Sen feld th solely the public good 2s they Cmoetand ie and from’ whose. deliberations ote of privet avenge, ae excl Tigh someplace it may still be necessary to Tesv tant the ambit of ren’ aeraism grows TEC, to the separate advantage of partcular % 2, Tue Enp oF Laissez-raine (1926) Let us clear from the ground the meta- physical or general principles upon which, from time to time, /aisrez-faire has been founded. Tes wo tras Wat aed poseae pre scriptive “natural liberty” in their economic that selicinterest generally is of often individuals acting separately to promote ‘nei owin ends Wie Sop sReorant or ac wsak ids af $60 iZnorant or feo weak fo | ataip_even these. Experience does vot chow that individuals when they make up social unit, are always less clearsighted than when they act separately. { ‘We cannot, therefore, settle on abstract grounds, but must handle on its merits in detail, ‘what Burke termed “one of the finest problems in legislation, namely, to determine what the groups, classes, or faculties—bodies which in 1 Bontham's Menal of Pala Feemy, poled pox emoaly in Bowsng eon (843) , ESSAYS IN PERSUASION rat the ordinary course of affairs are mainly auto- nomous within their prescribed limitations, but are subject in the last resort to the sovereignty of the democracy expressed through Parliament. [ propose a return, it may be said, towards mediaeval conceptions. of separate autonomies, ‘But, in England at any rate, corporations are a mode of government which has never ceased to be important and is sympathetic to our institu tions.’ Tt is easy to give examples, from what already exists, of separate autonomies which have attained or are approaching the mode I designate—the Universities, the Ban) - Fan fon Authority, even per- haps the Railway Companies. jue more interesting than these is the trend. ‘of Joint Stock Institutions, when they have reached a certain age and size, to approximate to the status of public corporations rather than that of individualistic private enterprise. O' sat intersting and unnoticed devo ea eR rae tT he ee “of big enterprise to sociahse ftset—Aporht ; ais Sarr promt or big tetton par ticularly a big railway or big public utility enter- prise, but also a big bank or big insurance Eompany-—at which the ovtners of the capital sr The’ shareholders, ave atmos aeelg ee sociated from the gnanagement, with the result ist the direct petsonal interest ofthe Later in the makiig of great prof becomes quite second ye Wine ths sage is eached, the genes Sabilny and reputation of the institution are ” POLITICS as TRaximum of prof for the shareholders. The Thareholders ust be tatisied by conventionally Skeguate dvidendss_ Dut once thi secur the iirece neerest of the. management onsite in. avoiding ests from the public S23 fom’ he customers ofthe concern. © This seeeetnonopolistic position renders them con- SGituoun ih the public eye and vulnerable to Wile auacks Tye exseme instance, perhaps, EPs tendency in the case of an snastuton, Grecneatlly the unrestricted property of private persons isthe Bank of England. eis almost Pits ay that there ino Cass of persons in RE Roglem of hom the Governor of the Bank ofEngland thinks less when he decides ta'tie policy than of his shareholders, The Sighs, fn eacessof thelr conventional dividend, tte tready: sunk to the neighbourhood of Zero. "Bue the same thing 13 pardy true of erty other big institutions. They. ste, 38 Eine goes on, sovaising themselves. "Not that this is unmixed gain. The same causes promote conservatam and & waning of Suespee. tp face we aeady have in these well ae ER Nevertheless we see roe Tehinks a natural ine ak cwoiution. The Date of Soca gains nlite private ese e bang WON fe Getal HoUT-by Mow In Fee erucalar felts remaine seate lse- where—this is no longer the pressing problem. 36 Esa ‘SIN PERSUASION naar ‘There is, for instance, no so-called important political question so lant, 60 irrelevant to the reorganisation of the economic life of Great Britain, as the Nationalisation of she Railways Te is true that many big undertakings, ticularly Public Utility enterprises and other business requiring a large fixed capital, stl need to Be a jut We must keep 2 Seng te eee Gediisocatity We smost tke ful advantage of the natura? tendencies of the day, and $e vst probably prefer sesitlonemons argo cal Government for Hing fo 0% whch Minurersof Stateare direct responsible criticise oct socialism, not because it seeks to engage men's altruistic in pulses in the service of Society, or because it Geparts fiom aissez-faire, of because it takes away from man's natural liberty to make a nilllon, or because it has courage for bold experiments. All these things T applaud. 1 criticise it because it misses the significance of what is actualy happening; because Ter et, Title Better Tan & dusty survival ofa plan to meet the problems of fy year ago, Died go a misundertaning of what someone sia hundred years ago. Nineteenth.century State Socialism sprang’ from Bentham, fee coupes tion, etc. and is in some respects a clearer, in some respects a more muddled, version of just Pee shoes wed century individual w. Both equally laid-all " POLITICS 7 their stress on freedom, the one negatively-co avoid limitations on existing freedom, the other ae positively to_ dest polies. They are diferent Intellectual atmosphere, (2) Lcome next to 2 criterion of Agenda which is particularly relevant to what itis urgent and desirable to do in the near future. We must aim at separating those services which are tech- wiclly salons those which ate taal fe Geidual "The most important Agnds of the State relate not to those activities which private individuals are already fulélling, But to. those. functions which fall outside the sphere of the individual, to those decisions which are made by 20 one ifthe State does not make them. |The important thing for Government. is not 10 do things which individuals are doing already, and todo them a little better or a litle worses) but tural or acquired mono- tions to the same Te i not within the scope of my purpose on this occasion to develop practical policies limit myself, therefore, to naming some in- stances of what I-mean from amongst those problems about which 1 happen to have thought ‘Many. of. the greatest sc erils of our time are the fruits of risk, uncertaingy, and ignorance. Its because particular individuals, férunate in station or in abt are able co take advantage of uncertainty and ignorance, tnd also because for the same reason big busi~ 38 ESSAYS IN PERSUASION sar ness is often a lottery, that great inequalities of ‘wealth come about; and these same factors are also the cause of the Unemployment of Labour, for the disappointment of reasonable business ‘expectations, and of the impairment of efficiency and production. Yet the cure lies outside the ‘operations of individuals; it may even be to the jneerest of individuals to aggravate the disease. ‘believe ings is partly to be sought in the deliberate control of the currency and of credit bya c iution, and partly in the collection and dissemination fon a great scale of data relating to the business situation, inchading the full publicity, by laseif necessary of al busines fact which it seful toknow. ‘These measures would involve Society in exercising directive intelligence through some appropriate organ of action over many of the inner inicaies of private busines yet, it would leave private initiative and enterprise un- Hindered. Even if these measures prove in- sufficient, nevertheless they will furnish us with better knowledge than we have now for taking the next step. ‘My second example relates to Savings and Investment. [bei ae soardinated ? ‘eae Swhighices desiable tat te comunity clei ve, ese oe te ;0 abroad in the form_of foreign saad whether the present organise. ‘the investment market distributes savings long ne move Raion productive Ghanook, w PoLirics a 1 do not think that these matters should be lefe entirely to the chances of private judgement and priate profit a they are at pretense My third example concerns Population. The time has tzeady come when ek@hCoUnE needs considered national policy about what size of Population, whether larger or smaller than 3¢ resent or the same, is most expedient. An« saving sated this policy WE HSE Te steps to carry it into operation. The time may arrive 4 Te ater when the community gs.8 whole must pay attention to the innate quality as well the mere numbers of members. “These reflections have been directed sowards TSa Caplatier by the agency of colecive Eon There is nothings them wich is FEroully incompatible with what seems to me to be the essential characteristic of Capislism, q "Nor muse I, so near tomy end, stray towards other fields." Never- theless, I may do well to remind you, in con- clusion, that the fiercest contests and the most deeply fet divisions of opinion are likely to be ‘waged in the coming years not round technical questions, where the arguments on either side are mainly economic, but round those which, for want of better words, may be called psycho ogical or, perhaps, moral: eo ESSAYS IN PERSUASION raat In Europe, orat least in some parts of Europe

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