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- Title
Alfred Marshall and the Early Development of the London School of Economics: Some Unpublished Letters.
- Authors
Coats, A. W.
- Abstract
This article highlights some of the letters of British economist Alfred Marshall to W. A. S. Hewins, first director of the London School of Economics (LSE) in England. The letters are of interest for three distinct reasons. First, they disclose Marshall's conception of economics as a science and as a practical study. Second, they explain his objections to Hewins' report on the LSE. Third, they contain significant remarks on the state of economics teaching and study at Cambridge shortly before Marshall began his campaign for an Economics Tripos. Marshall evidently considered that Hewins' account of the LSE, which appeared in a government publication in 1898, did less than justice to the situation at Cambridge and he probably felt that Hewins had painted far too gloomy a picture of the state of British economics prior to 1895. At that time, according to Hewins, scarcely any branch of English higher education was so ill provided for as economics. Scientific work had usually been subordinated to the study of practical questions, and economics had been neglected by existing educational institutions and starved of both state and private funds. The leading British economic writers had rarely derived their inspiration or their preparatory training from elementary economics; the number of academic economists was small; professorships were few and poorly paid; and consequently talented men turned to other matters, refusing to embark upon a scholarly and scientific career in which bare subsistence is uncertain.
- Subjects
LONDON (England); ENGLAND; LETTERS; MARSHALL, Alfred, 1842-1924; HEWINS, W. A. S.; ECONOMICS; LONDON School of Economics &; Political Science
- Publication
Economica, 1967, Vol 34, Issue 136, p408
- ISSN
0013-0427
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.2307/2552092