'Very Deep Is the Well of the Past' -- A Review of M. De Vroey's 'A History of Macroeconomics from Keynes to Lucas and Beyond'

Abstract

Michel De Vroey, professor emeritus of Universite Catholique de Louvain, hardly needs to be presented to the readers interested in the history of modern macroeconomics. The researcher, who has risen to fame as the visiting professor of some high-flying universities, including Sorbonne of Paris or Duke University of North Carolina, will deservedly crown his professional career with this new work. His previous papers and books (among which there are pieces written both in English and French) demonstrate his particular interest in the evolution of high theory between Keynes and Lucas, especially in the deep analysis of Keynesian economics, neoclassical synthesis, and new classical macroeconomics led by Robert E. Lucas. Of course, these labels cannot comprehend the realm covered by Prof. De Vroey’s interest and his unsurpassable knowledge. One could hardly find an area within modern macroeconomics on which he has not exerted his detailed and grounded views yet. The warm reception and the keen interest excited by this work are clearly described by the simple fact that the publishing house has run out of its printed copies in one month and a half of distribution, so, while I am writing these lines, the readers have to wait for a reprint. The volume endows its author with authority even at first sight and it is evident when first looking at the short recommendations on the back cover by Olivier J. Blanchard or even by Lucas himself who we will face. We can read the commentaries of a historian of economic thought who was privileged to observe directly the most exciting decades of the evolution of modern macroeconomics. He is a witness and an insider.