1st Edition
Piero Sraffa: The Man and the Scholar Exploring His Unpublished Papers
Previously published as special issues of The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought and The Review of Political Economy, this volume contains the papers devoted to the life and work of Piero Sraffa.
Sraffa was a leading intellectual of the twentieth century. He was brought to Cambridge by John Maynard Keynes and had an important impact on the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein. He received the golden medal Söderström of the Swedish Academy of Sciences for his edition of David Ricardo's Works and Correspondence and he is the author of Production of Commodities by Means of Commodities, one of the most often cited book in economics. Using hitherto unpublished material from Sraffa's literary heritage kept at Trinity College, Cambridge, the papers throw new light on the intellectual development of the young Sraffa and correct several of the received views on him and his contribution. Themes covered concern his:
- objectivism
- rediscovery and reformulation of the classical theory of value and distribution
- criticism of Alfred Marshall's analysis
- relationship with his Cambridge colleagues and friends
- biography around the time when he left Italy for the UK
- friendship with Wittgenstein and his impact on the latter's thinking.
Preface
PART I
1. The Sraffa-enigma: Introduction Luigi L. Pasinetti
2. Piero Sraffa: emigration and scientific activity (1921–45) Nerio Naldi
3. Sraffa and the Marshallian tradition Annalisa Rosselli
4. Piero Sraffa at the University of Cambridge Maria Cristina Marcuzzo
5. On a turning point in Sraffa’s theoretical and interpretative position in the late 1920s Pierangelo Garegnani
6. Removing an ‘insuperable obstacle’ in the way of an objectivist analysis: Sraffa’s attempts at fixed capital Heinz D. Kurz and Neri Salvadori
7. Joint production: triumph of economic over mathematical logic? Bertram Schefold
PART II
8. Introduction Neri Salvadori
9. Sraffa’s lectures on continental banking: a preliminary appraisal Marcello de Cecco
10. Piero Sraffa’s lectures on the advanced theory of value 1928–31 and the rediscovery of the classical approach Rodolfo Signorino
11. Sraffa and Wittgenstein: physicalism and constructivism Mathieu Marion
12. Sraffa and Gramsci: a recollection Giorgio Napolitano
13. Representing the production and circulation of commodities in material terms: on Sraffa’s objectivism Heinz D. Kurz and Neri Salvadori
14. Bringing the edition of Ricardo’s works to completion: the making of the general index, 1951–73 Christian Gehrke
15. The comparative statics of industry-level produced-input-use in HOS trade theory Ian Steedman
16. Reflections on Sraffa’s legacy in economics: a review essay Sergio Nistico` and Giorgio Rodano
Biography
Professor Kurz is Professor of Economics at the University of Graz, Austria.
Luigi Pasinetti is Professor Emeritus at the Catholic University of Milan, Italy.
Neri Salvadori is Professor of Economics at the University of Pisa, Italy.
