Karl Polanyi for Historians: An Alternative Economic Narrative

The purpose of this essay is to provide the historian with a generic understanding of the term economy by examining some aspects of the work of the Hungarian “economic historian” Karl Polanyi (1886–1964). It does not seek to explain Polanyi's economic ideas to economists nor does it seek to locate his ideas within the discourses of the academic discipline of economics; there is abundant academic literature which carries out those tasks. This essay is intended to help fill a void in the historical understanding, especially the modern historical understanding, of the term economy, and of how the characteristics associated with it are generally understood. Yet, in reality, it is the neoclassical paradigm of economics which is typically and uncritically taken to be the touchstone for understanding the economy. This circumstance is problematic, however, when referring to the economy of societies earlier than the late nineteenth century or of societies whose culture differs radically from that of the advanced capitalist “west.” Polanyi's insights may help historians avoid the risk of either distorting or anachronistically misunderstanding the economy of such societies.     

Friedrich Hayek and Michael Polanyi in Correspondence

Friedrich Hayek and Michael Polanyi corresponded with each other for the best part of thirty years. They had shared interests that included science, social science, economics, epistemology, history of ideas and political philosophy. Studying their correspondence and related writings, this article shows that Hayek and Polanyi were committed Liberals but with different understandings of liberty, the forces that endanger liberty, and the policies required to rescue it.     

On Authority and Political Destination: Michael Polanyi and the Threshold of Postmodernism

ABSTRACT

This study challenges a prevalent view that Aquinas's political thought develops over time on the question of legitimate resistance to tyranny. Many scholars argue that Aquinas gradually restricts the scope of legitimate political resistance and morally permissible tyrannicide. On this view Aquinas defends tyrannicide in his early Commentary on the Sentences, adds strong qualifications in the Summa Theologiae, and finally repudiates tyrannicide in De Regno. This study finds the evidence for such a development lacking and seeks to rehabilitate a long and diverse Thomistic tradition of legitimate resistance including tyrannicide. Indeed, a close reading of De Regno shows that Aquinas upholds a doctrine of political resistance and defends the legitimacy of tyrannicide under certain circumstances. Moreover, Aquinas's doctrine of political resistance is wide open and underdeveloped. Later attempts to clarify and qualify Aquinas's doctrine of political resistance, therefore, are appropriate and even necessary.     

Debate and commentary

Mikael Venge, Fra åretold til toldetat. Middelalderen indtil 1660. Dansk Toldhistorie (From Our Toll to a Customs Service. The Middle Ages up to 1660. Danish Toll History), vol. 1 (The Society for Toll History, K?benhavn, 1987), 314 pp., ISBN 87 87796 08 2.

Birgit Bjerre Jensen, Udnævnelsesretten i enevældens magt bolitiske system 1660–1730 (The Right of Appointment in the Power Politics of Danish Absolutism 1660–1730) Administrative‐historical Studies no. 12, The Royal Archives (Gads Publishers, 1987), 376 pp., ISBN 87 7497 103 4.

Niels Finn Christiansen, Arbejderbevægelsens forhistorie (The Pre‐History of the Danish Labour Movement. Traits of the Early Danish Labour Movement's Political and Social Development 1848–1880). SFAH's publications series no. 18 (1986), 188 pp., ill., ISBN 87 87739 216, 120 Dkr. (member's rate 100 Dkr.).

Anders Berge, Sakkundskap och politisk rationalitet. Den svenska flottan och pansarfartygsfrågan 1918–1939 (Expertise and Political Rationality: The Swedish Navy and the Armoured Ship Issue 1918–1939), Acta Universitatis Stockholmiensis 37 (Stockholm: Almqvist &; Wiksell, 1987), 246 pp., ISBN 91 22 00883 7.

Olav Riste, (ed.), Western Security: The Formative Years. European and Atlantic Defence 1947–1953 (Oslo; Norwegian University Press, 1985), 333 pp.     

乔治·奥威尔和卡尔·魏特夫

今年是英国小说家乔治·奥威尔百岁诞辰。国内外都出版有关著作纪念他 ,尤其在西方。他的名著《一九八四》以反对“极权主义”著称 ,载誉至今 ,并引起争议。若干年前 ,同样反对“东方极权主义”的美国史家卡尔·魏特夫的百岁诞辰却是冷冷清清的 ,形成鲜明对照。他和他的代表作《东方专制主义》早已风光不再。本文对这两位名家以及他们不同的遭遇进行了分析。     

Some Angles on the Anglo Debate

Little can be done to replace English as the world’s common language for full WAC congresses. WAC intercongresses, however, offer an opportunity for linguistic (and intellectual) diversity. A regular plenary session at WAC full congresses in which the best works in archaeological theory are presented, with special efforts to include archaeologists whose works are not in English (in addition to those whose works are in English) might help insure diversity of perspectives in WAC.     

Goody,Polanyi and Eurasia: An Unfinished Project in Comparative Historical Economic Anthropology

Goody's essay overlaps with his recent work on the “search for metals” and, more generally, with his many books expounding the commonalities of Eurasian history. His critique of Eurocentrism remains invaluable. This review article argues that his emphasis on diffusion can be usefully supplemented with a concept of civilization, to facilitate comparative structural analysis. Goody's perspective might also be enhanced by an engagement with the literature on “Axial Age” cosmologies and with substantivist economic anthropology. It is worth revisiting Karl Polanyi's efforts to grasp the position of the economy in society, in order to recover in the neoliberal present the long-run Eurasian dialectic between redistribution and market exchange.     

Karl Popper on Jewish Nationalism and Cosmopolitanism

This paper re-contextualizes Karl Popper's thought within the anti-nationalist cosmopolitan tradition of the Central European intelligentsia. It argues that, although Popper was brought up in an assimilated Jewish Viennese household, from the perspective of the Jewish Enlightenment or Haskalah tradition, he can be seen to be a modern day heterodox Maskil (scholar). Popper's ever present fear of anti-Semitism and his refusal to see Judaism as compatible with cosmopolitanism raise important questions as to the realisable limits of the cosmopolitan ideal. His inability to integrate an understanding of Jewishness in his cosmopolitan political ideal resulted in his strong opposition to Zionism and the state of Israel. By comparing Popper's positions with those of Hermann Cohen, another neo-Kantian philosopher, I argue that although their solutions fall short in certain respects, their arguments have continuing purchase in recent debates on cosmopolitanism and the problem of the integration of minority groups. In addition, the arguments of the Jewish Enlightenment thinkers offer important insights for the current debates on minority integration and xenophobia.     

Polish Historiography of the Holocaust--Between Silence and Public Debate

The story of Polish historiography of the Holocaust lends itselfto divisions when one analyses the number of publications, andthe questions asked by the scholars in the field. There wasa great deal of valuable activity in the period immediatelyfollowing the Second World War and, to a lesser extent, up to1968; the revitalization of the field at the end of the twentiethcentury has roots that go back to the late 1980s. Holocaustscholarship in Poland has changed in many respects since theend of the war. Within the last three years a number of importantpublications have appeared that challenge the long-held assumptionsof Polish historians about the fate of Polish Jewry under Nazioccupation. These works have transformed the field with respectboth to the key topics for investigation and the questions askedby historians researching these aspects of the Holocaust. JanT. Gross led the way with Neighbors, published in 2000. Thisbook opened a heated discussion, and became an important triggerin the process of changing Polish Holocaust historiography.