Recent Work by Keith Tribe
Before Political Economy, 2024
During the 1790s Britain experienced a series of poor harvests which, given an expanding populati... more During the 1790s Britain experienced a series of poor harvests which, given an expanding population and wartime disruption to the European grain trade, resulted in sudden and rapid increases in the domestic price of wheat. In modern discussion of Corn and Poor
The most complete account of the context and purpose of the 1948 German Currency Reform, the disc... more The most complete account of the context and purpose of the 1948 German Currency Reform, the discussion here of post-war monetary policy and inflation seems today curiously relevant once more in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. In particular, the form in which the Nazi government financed its armaments programme looks rather like "quantitative easing", while the postwar condition of Germany bears comparison with the notion of "stagflation" from the 1970s. Furthermore, in concluding that "inflation is not a monetary phenomenon" the essay highlights the limitations of modern discussion of inflation.
This paper, developed from my Istvan Hont Memorial Lecture of 2015, considers the work of Alfred ... more This paper, developed from my Istvan Hont Memorial Lecture of 2015, considers the work of Alfred Marshall in Cambridge not from the perspective its eventual outcome, but instead from that of its slow and complex genesis, in the context of the Moral Sciences Tripos. By placing Sidgwick's own political economy in the context of the response to Mill's utilitarianism, it is possible to understand rather better why Marshall sought to diminish the importance of Jevons's Theory of Political Economy (1871), while also seeing more clearly how Sidgwick's Methods of Ethics (1874) relates to contemporary political economy.
Tribe (eds.) Cameralism in Practice. State Administration and Economy in Early Modern Europe, Boy... more Tribe (eds.) Cameralism in Practice. State Administration and Economy in Early Modern Europe, Boydell and Brewer, Woodbridge 2017 (ISBN 978 1 78327 212 9)
My 1988 monograph on the Kameralwissenschaften and the formation of Nationaloekonomie is now in p... more My 1988 monograph on the Kameralwissenschaften and the formation of Nationaloekonomie is now in print again in a reset edition.
This introduction to the work of Adam Smith was written for my then sixteen-year old grand-daught... more This introduction to the work of Adam Smith was written for my then sixteen-year old grand-daughter in December 2015 as a way of showing that Wealth of Nations was both accessible and interesting. I post it now to mark the entry into production of the new book that Roger Backhouse and I have written on the history of economics, which I discuss in a post on my website keithtribe.co.uk.
This version of my paper on Weber's lecture "Wissenschaft als Beruf" was presented at Copenhagen... more This version of my paper on Weber's lecture "Wissenschaft als Beruf" was presented at Copenhagen Business School on 24 November 2016 and replaces the earlier French version.
This collection of essays seeks to move discussion on from the many critiques of Thomas Piketty's... more This collection of essays seeks to move discussion on from the many critiques of Thomas Piketty's account of inequality to a more positive phase of exploration of concepts and data.
This paper is primarily concerned with the practice of the translation of historical works in the... more This paper is primarily concerned with the practice of the translation of historical works in the field of politics and economics, pointing out that most discussion in this area relates to lexical choices, while neglecting syntactic issues. It also discusses in greater depth issues arising in the translation of a later seventeenth-century text, Hoernigk's Oesterreich ueber alles.
The uncertainties of population changes are explored through first, a critique of Malthus's Essay... more The uncertainties of population changes are explored through first, a critique of Malthus's Essay on Population, showing that an author with an empirical and inductive reputation relied heavily upon "stylised facts" at odds with the world around him, and a theodicy opposed to social and political reform; second, through the examination of predictions made in the mid-twentieth century that Britain's population was on a path of secular decline.
I present her a brief introduction to my new book, copied off my website.
Max Weber by Keith Tribe
While Weber's interest in Prussian agrarian policy in the 1890s is generally recognised, there ha... more While Weber's interest in Prussian agrarian policy in the 1890s is generally recognised, there have been no serious attempts t o examine the extensive writings that were the outcome of this interest. This article seeks t o provide an outline of the issues arising in this work and present them in terms of the changing structure of Wilhelmine politics. Further, it is shown that important 'methodological' issues surface in these writings which form the basis for the later writings addressed t o questions of the tasks and role of the social sciences. Thus presented, the distinction between Weber's 'historical' and 'empirical' work on the one hand, and his 'theoretical' contributions o n the other, can be shown t o be invalid.
Essay on the work of Wilhelm Hennis from his 90th birthday Festschrift edited by Andreas Anter, W... more Essay on the work of Wilhelm Hennis from his 90th birthday Festschrift edited by Andreas Anter, Wilhelm Hennis' Politische Wissenschaft (2013)
During the 1950s at the latest, Max Weber became a 'founding father' of sociology, chiefly on the... more During the 1950s at the latest, Max Weber became a 'founding father' of sociology, chiefly on the basis of a restricted set of canonical writings and without any consideration of his wider relationships to law, economics and politics. During the last ten years of his life he was responsible for a major collaborative work, the Grundriss der Sozialökonomik-Outline of Social Economics. The title was of his own choosing; and so it might well shed new light on his work if we consider how this work was organised, and how Economy and Society, written as a contribution to this handbook, was intended to form part of it.
The first four chapters of Max Weber's Economy and Society presented by Talcott Parsons in 1947 a... more The first four chapters of Max Weber's Economy and Society presented by Talcott Parsons in 1947 as Theory of Social and Economic Organization present a coherent and complete analysis of social, economic and political structures based upon a consistent theory of social action and its understanding. Parsons did not see them this way. His lengthy introduction sought to insert them into his own ''action frame of reference'', and his rearrangement of the text made it difficult for a reader to understand why it was constructed the way that it is. This essay describes how Parsons came to be principal translator and editor of the text, examines the changes that he made to it, and links his editorial practice to the analytical procedures that he followed in his Structure of Social Action. r I Twenty-five years ago, closing the first of a series of major essays on Max Weber, Wilhelm Hennis drew attention to the unreliability of English translations of Max Weber's writing. 1 Citing the passage from the 1913 essay on value-freedom where Weber argues ARTICLE IN PRESS www.elsevier.com/locate/histeuroideas 0191-6599/$ -see front matter r
Knut Borchardt, Einleitung Sicherung und Pflege von Webers Werk M. Rainer Lepsius, Münchens Bezie... more Knut Borchardt, Einleitung Sicherung und Pflege von Webers Werk M. Rainer Lepsius, Münchens Beziehungen zu Max Weber und zur Pflege seines Werks Edith Hanke, "Max Webers Schreibtisch ist nun mein Altar". Marianne Weber und das geistige Erbe ihres Mannes
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Recent Work by Keith Tribe
Max Weber by Keith Tribe