Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rcrh6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T11:55:23.434Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

ALBION W. SMALL’S NEGLECTED PROGRESSIVE VIEWS: REDUCING INEQUALITIES FOR A REASONABLE CAPITALISM

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 March 2019

Virgile Chassagnon  and
Guillaume Vallet
Virgile Chassagnon
Affiliation:
University of Grenoble Alpes (UGA), CREG Research Center; IREPE
Guillaume Vallet
Affiliation:
University of Grenoble Alpes (UGA), CREG Research Center; IREPE
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This paper sheds light on Albion Small’s views on the inequalities resulting from capital concentration. As a leading intellectual of the Progressive Era, Small sought ways to reduce social injustice, which in his view was key to avoiding class conflict and preserving democracy. He emphasized the need to devise social policies with a view to ensuring the equality of opportunities for all to realize what Small termed their “interests”—through the combination of their labor with “tool-capital.” Small entrusted the State with the central role of fighting capital inequalities through social policies, the treatment of inequalities dealing with morals. He embraced the then-fashionable idea of reasonable capitalism, as expounded by fellow progressive scholars, the likes of Richard T. Ely, John Dewey, or John R. Commons, who all sensed that such an economic system would survive only if it improves the social well-being as well as the self-development of all individuals.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of the History of Economic Thought , Volume 41 , Issue 1 , March 2019 , pp. 77 - 98
Copyright
Copyright © The History of Economics Society 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Abbott, Andrew. 1999. Department and Discipline. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alstott, Anne. 2006. “War, Taxes, and Income Redistribution in the Twenties: The 1924 Veterans’ Bonus and the Defeat of the Mellon Plan.” Tax Law Review 59: 373–438.Google Scholar
Bulmer, Martin. 1980. “The Early Institutional Establishment of Social Science Research.” Minerva 18: 51–110.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bourguignon, François, and Morrisson, Christian. 2002. “Inequality among World Citizens.” American Economic Review 92 (4): 727–744.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bradizza, Luigi. 2008. Richard T. Ely’s Critique of Capitalism. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Campagna, Anthony. 1987. U.S. National Economic Policy, 1917–1985. New York: Praeger.Google Scholar
Chauvel, Louis. 2006. “Are Social Classes Really Dead? A French Paradox in Class Dynamics.” In Therborn, G., ed., Inequalities of the World. London: Verso, pp. 295–317.Google Scholar
Christakes, Georges. 1978. Albion W. Small. Boston: Twayne Publishers.Google Scholar
Chassagnon, Virgile. 2011. “The Network-Firm as a Single Real Entity: Beyond the Aggregate of Distinct Legal Entities.” Journal of Economic Issues 45 (1): 113–136.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chassagnon, Virgile. 2014. “Toward a Social Ontology of the Firm: Reconstitution, Organizing Entity, Institution, Social Emergence and Power.” Journal of Business Ethics 124 (2): 197–208.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Commons, John R. 1921. Legal Foundations of Capitalism. New York: The Macmillan Company.Google Scholar
Commons, John R. 1934. Institutional Economics: Its Place in Political Economy. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press.Google Scholar
Dewey, John. 1893. “Self-Realization as the Moral Ideal.” The Philosophical Review 2: 652–664.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dewey, John. 1897. My Pedagogical Creed. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Dewey, John. 1902. “Interpretation of the Savage Mind.” Psychological Review 9: 217–230.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dewey, John. 1922. Human Nature and Conduct: An Introduction to Social Psychology. New York: Modern Library.Google Scholar
Dewey, John. 1935. Liberalism and Social Action. New York: J.P. Putnam.Google Scholar
Dewey, John, and Tufts, James H.. 1913. Ethics. New York: Henry Holt and Co.Google Scholar
Dibble, Vernon K. 1975. The Legacy of Albion Small. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Diner, Steven J. 1998. A Very Different Age. Americans of the Progressive Era. New York: Hill and Wang.Google Scholar
Ely, Richard T. 1894. “Fundamental Beliefs in My Social Philosophy.” The Forum 18: 173–183.Google Scholar
Ely, Richard T. 1902. “Industrial Liberty.” Publications of the American Economic Association 3 (1): 59–64.Google Scholar
Ely, Richard T. 1936. “The Founding and Early History of the American Economic Association.” American Economic Review 26 (1): 141–150.Google Scholar
Ely, Richard T., King, Willford I., and Orth, Samuel P.. [1914] 2015. Property and Contract in Their Relation to the Distribution of Wealth. Volume 1. Rochester: Scholar’s Choice.Google Scholar
Faris, Robert E. L. 1970. Chicago Sociology 1920–1932. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Fine, Sydney. 1951. “Richard T. Ely, Forerunner of Progressivism, 1880–1901.” The Mississippi Valley Historical Review 37 (4): 599–624.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Giddings, Franklin H. 1896. The Principles of Sociology. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Giddings, Franklin H. 1906. “Sovereignty and Government.” Political Science Quarterly 21 (1): 1–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Glaeser, Edward, Scheinkman, José, and Shleifer, Andrei. 2002. “The Injustice of Inequality.” NBER Working Paper Series 9150.Google Scholar
Hodgson, Geoffrey M. 2013. From Pleasure Machines to Moral Communities: An Evolutionary Economics without Homo Economicus. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Kuznets, Simon. 1955. “Economic Growth and Income Inequality.” American Economic Review 65 (1): 1–28.Google Scholar
Lengermann, Patricia, and Niebrugge, Gillian. 2007. “Thrice Told: Narratives of Sociology’s Relation to Social Work.” In Calhoun, Craig, ed., Sociology in America. A History. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, pp. 63–115.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lindert, Peter. 2000. “Three Centuries of Inequality in Britain and America.” In Atkinson, Anthony and Bourguignon, François, eds., Handbook of Income Distribution. Amsterdam: North-Holland, pp. 167–216.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lindert, Peter, and Williamson, Jeffrey. 1985. “Growth, Equality, and History.” Explorations in Economic History 22: 341–377.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Matthews, Fred H. 1977. Quest for an American Sociology: Robert E. Park and the Chicago School. Montreal: McGill-Queens University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O’Rourke, Kevin H. 2002. “Globalization and Inequality: Historical Trends.” In Pleskovic, Boris and Stern, Nicholas, eds., Annual World Bank Conference on Development Economics 2001/2002. Washington: The World Bank, pp. 39–67.Google Scholar
Park, Robert E. 1950. Race and Culture. Glencoe: The Free Press.Google Scholar
Patten, Simon N. [1890] 2008. The Economic Basis of Protection. Charleston: BiblioBazaar.Google Scholar
Peukert, Helge. 2001. “Bridging Old and New Institutional Economics: Gustav Schmoller and Douglass North, Seen with Old Institutionalists’ Eyes.” European Journal of Law and Economics 11 (2): 91–130.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Piketty, Thomas. 2014. Capital in the Twenty-first Century. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Piketty, Thomas, and Saez, Emmanuel. 2003. “Income Inequality in the United States, 1913–1998.” Quarterly Journal of Economics 118 (1): 1–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Piketty, Thomas, and Saez, Emmanuel. 2014. “Inequality in the Long Run.” Science 344 (6186): 838–843.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Richter, Rudolf. 1996. “Bridging Old and New Institutional Economics.” Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics 152: 567–592.Google Scholar
Ross, Dorothy. 1991. The Origins of American Social Science. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Rutherford, Malcolm. 1996. Institutions in Economics. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Scase, Richard. 1992. Class. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Schmoller, Gustav. 1874. Über die Resultate der Bevölkerungs -und Moral- Statistik. Berlin: Habel.Google Scholar
Schmoller, Gustav. [1900] 1978. Grundriß der allgemeinen Volkswirtschaftslehre. Two volumes. Berlin: Duncker und Humblot.Google Scholar
Schneirov, Richard, Stromquist, Shelton, and Salvatore, Nick. 1999. The Pullman Strike and the Crisis of the 1890s. Essays on Labor and Politics. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Shackel, Paul A., and Palus, Matthew M.. 2006. “The Gilded Age and Working-Class Industrial Communities.” American Anthropologist 108 (4): 828–841.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1890. Introduction to a Science of Society. Waterville: Colby University.Google Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1895a. “The Civic Federation of Chicago. A Study in Social Dynamics.” American Journal of Sociology 1 (1): 79–103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1895b. “Private Business Is a Public Trust.” American Journal of Sociology 1 (1): 276–289.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1895c. “Scholarship and Social Agitation.” American Journal of Sociology 1 (1): 564–582.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1895d. “The Relation of Sociology to Economics.” Journal of Political Economy 3: 169–184.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1899a. “Sanity in Social Agitation.” American Journal of Sociology 4: 335–351.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1899b. “On the Capital Lent the Trusts.” Chicago Telegraph, 10 March.Google Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1903. “The Significance of Sociology for Ethics.” Decennial Publications of the University of Chicago 4: 23–24.Google Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1905. General Sociology. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1906. “Points of Agreements Among Sociologists.” American Journal of Sociology 12 (5): 633–649.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1907. Adam Smith and Modern Sociology: A Study in the Methodology of the Social Sciences. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1912. “Socialism in the Light of Social Science.” American Journal of Sociology 17 (6): 804–819.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1913. Between Eras: From Capitalism to Democracy. Kansas City: Inter-Collegiate Press.Google Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1914. “The Social Gradations of Capital.” American Journal of Sociology 9 (6): 721–752.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1916. “Fifty Years of Sociology in the United States (1865–1915).” American Journal of Sociology 21 (6): 721–864.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1917. “Americans and the World Crisis.” The University of Chicago War Papers 2: 3–23.Google Scholar
Small, Albion W. 1925. “The Sociology of Profits.” American Journal of Sociology 30 (4): 439–461.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smiley, Gene, and Keehn, Richard H.. 1995. “Federal Personal Income Tax Policy in the 1920s.” The Journal of Economic History 55 (2): 285–303.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sumner, William G. 1881. War and Other Essays. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Sumner, William G. [1883] 1978. What Social Classes Owe to Each Other. Caldwell: Caxton Printers.Google Scholar
Sumner, William G. 1906. Folkways: A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals. Boston: Ginn.Google Scholar
Veblen, Thorstein. 1898, “Why Is Economics Not an Evolutionary Science?” Quarterly Journal of Economics 12 (4): 373–397.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vallet, Guillaume. 2017. “Cooperation Rather than Competition in Industrial Organisations: Albion W. Small’s Underestimated View.” Business History 59 (3): 453–470.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williamson, Jeffrey. 1997. “Globalization and Inequality: Past and Present.” World Bank Research Observer 12 (2): 117–135.CrossRefGoogle Scholar