Veblen's theory of value and the problem of revolution

Abstract

One of the theoretical propositions which accord this volume coherence is that economic ideology drives economic understanding. Thus it is a diversity of ideological dispositions which yields the mixture of criticism and support that attends the various reactions to Thorstein Veblen's published work. In Tilman's carefully-detailed and extremely well-documented exposition, these range from "conservative" (usually neoclassical liberals), to liberal (actually reform liberalism in the tradition of John Stuart Mill and John Maynard Keynes), to "radical" (including institutionalists, neoinstitutionalists, Marxists within the Frankfurt School, those associated with Monthly Review, Trotsky ites, along with others usually thought of as "social democrats"). But a more subtle theme also unifies this book. This is the implicit argument that reviewers ? at least, perhaps, those who are remembered ? seldom pay much attention to that which they are presumably reviewing. They rarely try to discern its purpose or to engage the author's attempt to carry out that purpose on its own terms. What they actually do is to employ their role to assert and amplify positions held before they ever read ? or glanced at ? the writing they are supposedly dealing with. Plainly, their interest is less in describing what they have read than in contending with, and extrapolating from, it. Indeed, with the possible exception of some of the neoinstitutionalists, Tilman infers that none of the critics of Veblen represented in this book is sufficiently empathetic with, or even aware of, the totality of Veblen's position to portray it in an accurate manner. This Tilman himself tries to accomplish through his analysis of those who analyze Veblen, however hos? tile or friendly they may be to particular points within his work. Since Tilman presently stands among the foremost contemporary scholars of Thorstein Veblen, it is reasonable to think that his rendition of Veblen's ideas is more true to the subject than the myriad rebuttals, agreements,