LAWRENCE ABBOTT. Quality and Competition : An Essay in Economic Theory. Pp. ix, 229. New York: Columbia University Press, 1955. $3.75
| Author | Jules Kolodny |
| DOI | 10.1177/000271625630400134 |
| Published date | 01 March 1956 |
| Date | 01 March 1956 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
158
&dquo;Technological
Alternatives
and
the
Op-
timum
Use
of
Capital,&dquo;
and
&dquo;Foreign
In-
vestment
and
Capital
Formation.&dquo;
The
authors
believe
that
foreign
investment,
while
currently
of
little
importance,
could
have
some
real
significance
in
&dquo;triggering&dquo;
domestic
capital
formation
if
a
rather
for-
midable
array
of
obstacles
were
removed.
Ideas,
theories,
and
tools
of
analysis
per-
tinent
to
these
topics
are
taken
up
seriatim,
giving
the
general
reader
some
conception
of
the
wide
range
of
problems
relative
to
capital
formation
now
engaging
economists.
As
there
is
no
sustained
thesis
throughout
the
book
and
no
thoroughgoing
critical
evaluation
of
work
in
progress,
the
authors
have
produced
what
may
appear
to
the
layman
to
be
a
noncontroversial
book
on
economic
development,
a
highly
controver-
sial
subject
among
economists.
The
authors
observe
that
there
is
a
need
to
integrate
the
work
of
several
social
sci-
ences
in
any
serious
study
of
the
processes
of
economic
growth;
but
their
own
work
is
not
informed
by
this
insight
and
is
con-
fined
almost
exclusively
to
an
economic
exposition.
A
vital
dimension
of
develop-
ment,
namely
the
political
one,
gets
short
shrift.
This
is
regrettable
since
it
is
pre-
cisely
the
more
economically
backward
countries
which
seem
to
require
greater
State
participation
in
accelerating
the
rate
of
total
capital
formation,
investment
al-
location,
and
even
the
establishment
of
special
industries.
Encompassing
the
government’s
role
in
economic
decision-making
is
the
broader
question:
&dquo;What
is
the
relative
strength
of
those
forces
opposing
and
those
favoring
change?&dquo;
While
the
book
mentions
in
summary
fashion
the
need
for
social
change,
there
is
insufficient
emphasis
on
the
tremendous
impetus
given
to
economic
de-
velopment
and
capital
formation
by
pro-
found
alterations
of
power
relationships
within
a
given
society-whether
they
take
the
form
of
the
overthrow
of
feudalism
in
Japan,
recent
Communist
revolutions,
or
the
emergence
since
World
War
II
of
sovereign
states
in
the
East
following
cen-
turies
of
colonial
rule.
Sovereignty,
while
not
a
sufficient
cause
for
real
economic
de-
velopment,
would
certainly
appear
to
be
a
necessary
condition
in
this
very
context.
The
really
hopeful
aspects
of
South
and
Southeast
Asia’s
development
prospects
are
the
new
independence
of
the
various
states
and
the
attendant
decline
in
influence
of
forces
identified
with
the old
order.
Planners
in
new
Southeast
Asian
states
intent
on
rapid
economic
development
may
be
disappointed
by
the
omission
from
the
bibliography
of
references
describing
and
appraising
the
mechanisms
for
increasing
and
regulating
capital
formation
in
outright
socialist
economies.
Nevertheless,
the
fifty-
page
bibliography
provides
a
useful
guide
to
current
research
by
public
and
private
agencies
and
to
the
published
literature
on
the
wide
range
of
theory
and
practice
of
capital
formation
elsewhere.
Coming
late
to
the
feast,
the
poorer
nations
have
a
world
of
experience
on
which
they
intend
to
draw.
HELEN
B.
LAMB
Massachusetts
Institute
of
Technology
LAWRENCE
ABBOTT.
Quality
and
Competi-
tion :
An
Essay
in
Economic
Theory.
Pp.
ix,
229.
New
York:
Columbia
Uni-
versity
Press,
1955.
$3.75.
Classical
theory
bequeathed
to
economics
a
theory
of
pure
competition
with
complete
monopoly
treated
as
an
exceptional
case.
The
year 1933
which
saw
the
simultaneous
publication
of
Robinson’s
Economics
of
Imperfect
Competition
in
England
and
Chamberlin’s
The
Theory
of
Monopolistic
Competition
in
this
country
marked
a
de-
parture
from
this
viewpoint.
The
result
has
been
that
pure
competition
and
com-
plete
monopoly
are
no
longer
considered
adequate
models
of
reality.
No
longer
treated
as
typical
cases
they
are
still,
how-
ever,
looked
upon
as
idealizations.
Now,
almost
a
quarter
of
a
century
later,
an-
other
economist
announces
his
dissatisfac-
tion
with
the
picture
of
reality
which
these
two
recent
theories
have
developed;
nor
does
he
accept
pure
price
competition
as
an
adequate
idealization.
Professor
Abbott
has
written
a
book
in
economic
theory
which
is
addressed
pri-
marily
to
professional
economists
and
to
graduate
students.
Although
it
abounds
in
references
to
the
contributions
of
Robinson, Chamberlin,
Triffin,
Schumpeter,
Reder,
and
others,
the
book
may
be
read
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