Theories of Financial Disturbance

'This book will be of interest to advanced students looking for an even-handed overview of alternative theories of financial disturbances; academics who need a reference on the historical interrelationships of the literature in the field; and professionals who want to understand how the tools and concepts they use daily have emerged through time - and whether there are forgotten lessons to be heeded.' -- Susan K. Schroeder, Review of Political Economy 'Financial markets have an aura of disturbing instability. In this history of the thought of earlier economists who have studied the processes of finance, Jan Toporowski takes us on a fascinating journey to explore how they saw the impact of finance on the real economy. Not one for formal models, nor for rational expectations, Jan [Toporowski] values historical experience and the insights and experience of earlier great thinkers.' -- Charles A.E. Goodhart, CBE, London School of Economics and Political Science, UK 'Jan Toporowski's Theories of Financial Disturbance is a tour de force. With his substantial knowledge of financial markets, his deep conceptual understanding of relevant concepts and his exhaustive reading of the essential literature, he is ideally placed to tell an absorbing narrative of, as he writes, critical theories of finance from Adam Smith to the present days - and he has. In a world in which finance and industrial and commercial capital are so out of kilter with one another, Toporowski's lucid wisdom is required reading.' -- G.C. Harcourt, University of New South Wales, Australia

Jan Toporowski, Professor of Economics and Finance, SOAS University of London, UK, Visiting Professor of Economics and Finance, International University College, Turin, and Visiting Professor of Economics, University of Bergamo, Italy

Contents: Introduction Part I: A Premonition of Financial Fragility 1. Adam Smiths Economic Case Against Usury 2. The Vindication of Finance Part II: Critical Theories of Finance in the Twentieth Century: Unstable Money and Finance 3. Thorstein Veblen and Those Captains of Finance 4. Rosa Luxemburg and the Marxist Subordination of Finance 5. Ralph Hawtrey and the Monetary Business Cycle 6. Irving Fisher and Debt Deflation 7. John Maynard Keyness Financial Theory of Under-Investment I: Towards Doubt 8. John Maynard Keyness Financial Theory of Under-Investment II: Towards Uncertainty Part III: Critical Theories of Finance in the Twentieth Century: In the Shadow of Keynes 9. The Principle of Increasing Risk I: Marek Breit 10. The Principle of Increasing Risk II: Michal Kalecki 11. The Principle of Increasing Risk III: Michal Kalecki and Josef Steindl on Profits and Finance 12. A Brief Digression on Later Developments in Economics and Finance 13. The East Coast Historians: John Kenneth Galbraith, Charles P. Kindleberger and Robert Shiller 14. Hyman P. Minskys Financial Instability Hypothesis 15. Conclusion: The Disturbance of Economists by Finance Bibliography Index