Joseph Alois SCHUMPETER

by Frederic M. Scherer (J. F. Kennedy School of Government. Harvard University) In the year 1883, two of the world's most productive economists were born. Commemorating the event a century later, the U. S. business magazine Forbes asked which of the two, J ohn Maynard Keynes or J oseph Alois Schumpeter, made the greater, more endur- ing contributions. No doubt to the great surprise of its readers, it concluded that Schumpeter was the greatest eeonomist of the 20th eentury. ' In this volume professor Massimo M. Augello has done yeoman service by assembling a eomprehensive bibliography of works by Sehumpeter and, even more importantly, by other seholars pursuing and elaborating the themes Schumpeter first artieulated. With ap- proximately 1,900 entries, it must beeome the primary reference for those who wish to dig deeply in what has to be known as the Schumpeterian vision. During Sehumpeter's early years, the neoclassieal synthesis was rapidly beeoming the dominant paradigm in eeonomic thought -- a position it held for nearly a century. It was a synthesis because it brought together two eontending sehools: the utilitarians, who em- phasized the demand side in the determination of eeonomic value, and the labor value sehool, which emphasized the supply side.