Publication Date: November 2009
6 x 9. 272 pages. Introduction to the Liberty Fund edition, foreword by Ludwig von Mises, Becker-Kirzner Debate, introduction to the second edition, author’s preface, index.
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The Economic Point of View is
the inaugural volume in Liberty Fund’s new Collected Works of Israel M. Kirzner
series. This work established Kirzner as a careful and meticulous scholar of
economics. No other living economist is so closely associated with the AustrianSchool
of economics as Israel M. Kirzner, professor emeritus of economics at New YorkUniversity. He has been a leader of the
generation of AustrianSchool economists
following Ludwig von Mises and F. A. Hayek.
In The Economic Point of
View, Kirzner explores the basic ideas around which the entire body of economic
thought has revolved for some two centuries. He explains how the “economic
point of view” emerged in the development of economic science since the
eighteenth century and through it, the concepts of purpose, subjectivism, and
rationality. Kirzner’s incomparable ability to navigate through the core ideas
of economics helps the reader become progressively familiar with the history of
the discipline and its definition.
Within the seven chapters,
Kirzner discusses such subjects as the science of wealth and welfare; the
nature of economic science and the significance of macroeconomics; and the
sciences as human action, including a section on praxeology and its
relationship to the economic point of view. As Mises writes in his foreword to
the volume, “Dr. Kirzner’s book . . . is a very valuable contribution to the
history of ideas, describing the march of economics from a science of wealth to
a science of human action. . . . Every
economist—and for that matter everybody interested in problems of general
epistemology—will read with great profit Doctor Kirzner’s analyses.”
Peter J. Boettke is the BB&T
Professor for the Study of Capitalism at the MercatusCenter and a University Professor of
economics at GeorgeMasonUniversity.
His publications include Why Perestroika Failed: The Economics and Politics of
Socialist Transformation and Calculation and Coordination. Since 1998 he has
been the editor of the Review of Austrian Economics.
Frédéric Sautet is a Senior
Research Fellow at the MercatusCenter and a member of the graduate faculty at GeorgeMasonUniversity. He is the
author ofAn Entrepreneurial
Theory of the Firm and has widely published on entrepreneurship.
Additional Testimonials
Praise for the Previous Edition
...The Economic Point of View can be recommended both to the specialist and to those intrepid amateurs who are willing to struggle with its style and its numerous references to the literature in the field. It is probably the best single reference book now available on the history of the discussion of what constitutes "the economic point of view." Kirzner traces the discussion from approximately the time of Adam Smith, when economics was thought to be a wealth-centered study, through the period when it was thought to be centered on man in his wealth-getting activities, to the more modern definitions of economics as a science of human action (the praxeological view of economics, associated particularly with the name of Professor Mises).
Those who are tempted to ask, "What difference does it make how economics is defined?", would do well to read this book and find out. For example, the early definitions of economics in terms of wealth-getting were partly responsible for the low repute of the science. Its concern seemed to be only with the "vulgar" activities of man or when he was operating at his worst. The praxeological view, in which economics is viewed as the study of man in the process of making rational choices among alternatives, relieves economics of much of the stigma that was once attached to it for definitional reasons alone. This is a reference book that every economist, professional or amateur, should have on his shelf—after reading.
