Thorstein Veblen and Piero Sraffa: A New Level of Economic Theory

Abstract

Economic theories are integrally related to the social and historical processes from which they emerge. They evolve from, reflect, and seek to communicate explanations of the on‐going phenomena in which they participate. While, therefore, economic theories are mostly the product of the socio‐economic matrices in which they are conceived, the most influential political economists in history have also reflected the most advanced principles of science in their work. This they have done as their common calling to build a science of economic activity that would prove adequate to serving the most basic needs of people throughout the world and to meeting the growing requirements of public policy making. It is in these senses that the economic theories of Thorstein Veblen and Piero Sraffa have revealed the poverty and sterility of marginal utility speculations, while their combined innovations offer a hopeful prospect for continuing the classical heritage of production and social surplus theory which preceded the century‐long dominance of the demand‐and‐supply approach in political economy.

Citation

Griffin, R.A. (1987), "Thorstein Veblen and Piero Sraffa: A New Level of Economic Theory", International Journal of Social Economics, Vol. 14 No. 7/8/9, pp. 136-141. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb014076