Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T20:35:05.420Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

THEORIES OF THE FIRM IN ENGLAND BEFORE COASE: STEMMING THE TIDE OF ‘RATIONALIZATION’ ON THE EVE OF “THE NATURE OF THE FIRM”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 November 2015

Carlo Cristiano
Carlo Cristiano*
Affiliation:
University of Pisa.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Before the publication of Ronald Coase’s “The Nature of the Firm,” new developments in the theory of the firm were under way in the works of Arnold Plant at the LSE, and Dennis Robertson, Frederick Lavington, and Austin Robinson among the Cambridge Marshallians. Although in disagreement on industrial policy, these economists shared the belief that the common view that bigger firms are always more efficient—a very popular view within the movement for industrial ‘rationalization’—was untenable from a theoretical point of view. In the works of these economists the ‘make or buy’ scheme is sometimes employed, and Coase’s idea of a cost for using the market can be found, in implicit form, in some writings of Plant that appeared before Coase’s article. But the fundamental principle that we now call “transaction costs” was hardly of any help to any of those who, at Cambridge as well as at the LSE, were insisting on the costs of coordination as a limit to the growth of the firm.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of the History of Economic Thought , Volume 37 , Issue 4 , December 2015 , pp. 597 - 614
Copyright
Copyright © The History of Economics Society 2015 

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

Allen, George C. 1933. British Industries and Their Organization. London and New York: Longmans and Green.Google Scholar
Belussi, Fiorenza, and Caldari, Katia. 2011. “The Lancashire Industrial District: Its Rise, Prosperity and Decline in the Analysis of British Economists.” In Raffaelli, Tiziano, Nishizawa, Tamotsu, and Cook, Simon, eds., Marshall, Marshallians and Industrial Economics. London and New York: Routledge, pp. 135–162.Google Scholar
Blaug, Mark. 1968. Economic Theory in Retrospect. Homewood: Richard D. Irwin, Inc.Google Scholar
Blaug, Mark. 2001. “No History of Ideas, Please, We’re Economists.” Journal of Economic Perspectives 15 (1): 145–164.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brady, Robert A. 1932. “The Meaning of Rationalization: An Analysis of the Literature.” Quarterly Journal of Economics 46 (3): 526–540.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bylund, Per. 2014. “Ronald Coase’s ‘Nature of the Firm’ and the Argument for Economic Planning.” Journal of the History of Economic Thought 36 (3): 305–329.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Campbell, David, and Klaes, Matthias. 2005. “The Principle of Institutional Direction: Coase’s Regulatory Critique of Intervention.” Cambridge Journal of Economics 29 (2): 263–288.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cannan, Edwin. 1930. “The Problem of Unemployment, review of Henry Clay, The Post-War Unemployment Problem.” Economic Journal 40: 45–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clay, Henry. 1929. The Post-War Unemployment Problem. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Clay, Henry. 1930. “Dr. Cannan’s View of Unemployment.” Economic Journal 40: 331–335.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coase, Ronald H. 1937. “The Nature of the Firm.” Economica 4: 386–405.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coase, Ronald H. 1960. “The Problem of Social Cost.” Journal of Law and Economics 3: 1–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coase, Ronald H. 1970. “The Theory of Public Utility Pricing and Its Application.” The Bell Journal of Economics and Management Science 1 (1): 113–128.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coase, Ronald H. [1972] 1988a. “Industrial Organization: A Proposal for Research.” In Coase, R. H., The Firm, the Market and the Law. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Coase, Ronald H. 1988b. “The Nature of the Firm: Origin.” Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization 4: 3–17.Google Scholar
Coase, Ronald H. 1988c. “The Nature of the Firm: Meaning.” Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization 4: 19–32.Google Scholar
Coase, Ronald H. 1994. “Arnold Plant.” In Essays on Economics and Economists. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, pp. 176–184.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cristiano, Carlo. 2009. “Marshall at Cambridge.” In Raffaelli, Tiziano, Becattini, Giacomo, Caldari, Katia, and Dardi, Marco, eds., The Impact of Alfred Marshall’s Ideas. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, pp. 17–39.Google Scholar
Cristiano, Carlo. 2011. “Two Marshalians: Layton and the Early Macgregor.” In Raffaelli, Tiziano, Nishizawa, Tamotsu, and Cook, Simon, eds., Marshall, Marshallians and Industrial Economics. London and New York: Routledge, pp. 163–180.Google Scholar
Fitzgerald, Patrick. 1927. Industrial Combination in England. London: Pitman & Sons.Google Scholar
Florence, Philip Sargant. 1933. The Logic of Industrial Organization. London: Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Florence, Philip Sargant. 1934. “The Problem of Management and the Size of Firms.” Economic Journal 44: 723–729.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grant, Isabel Frances. 1922. “The Survival of the Small Unit in Industry.” Economic Journal 32: 489–505.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacobsen, Lowell R. 2008. “On Robinson, Coase and ‘The Nature of the Firm.’” Journal of the History of Economic Thought 30 (1): 65–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, John Harry. 1926. The Economics of Private Enterprise. London: Pitman & Sons Ltd.Google Scholar
Kahn, Richard F. 1983. L’Economia del Breve Periodo. Torino: Boringhieri.Google Scholar
Kahn, Richard F. 1989. The Economics of the Short Period. Basingstock: Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keynes, John Maynard. 1971–1989. The Collected Writings of John Maynard Keynes (CWK). Managing editors Robinson, E. A. G. and Moggridge, D.. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Klaes, Matthias. 2000. “The History of the Concept of Transaction Costs: Neglected Aspects.” Journal of The History of Economic Thought 22 (2): 191–216.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lavington, Frederick. 1927. “Technical Influences on Vertical Integration.” Economica 7: 27–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Levy, Hermann. 1911. Monopoly and Competition. A Study in English Industrial Organization. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Levy, Hermann. 1927. Monopolies, Cartels and Trusts in British Industry. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Macgregor, David H. 1906. Industrial Combination. London: Bell & Sons.Google Scholar
Macgregor, David H. 1927. “Rationalisation of Industry.” Economic Journal 37: 521–550.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Macgregor, David H., Ryan, John, et al. 1930. “Problems of Rationalisation.” Economic Journal 40: 351–368.Google Scholar
Macrosty, Henry W. 1907. The Trust Movement in British Industry. A Study of Business Organisation. London: Longmans, Green & Co.Google Scholar
Marchionatti, Roberto. 1995. “Keynes and the Collapse of the British Cotton Industry in the 1920s: A Microeconomic Case against Laissez-Faire.” Journal of Post-Keynesian Economics 17: 427–445.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marshall, Alfred. 1890. “Some Aspects of Competition.” Journal of the Royal Statistical Society 53: 612–643.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marshall, Alfred. 1893. “On Rent.” Economic Journal 3: 74–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marshall, Alfred. 1897. “The Old Generation of Economists and the New.” Quarterly Journal of Economics 11: 115–135.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marshall, Alfred. 1919. Industry and Trade. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Meakin, Walter. 1928. The New Industrial Revolution: A Study for the General Reader of Rationalisation and Post-war Tendencies of Capitalism and Labour. London: Gollancz.Google Scholar
Medema, Steven. 1994. Ronald H. Coase. Basingstoke: Macmillan; New York: St. Martin’s Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Plant, Arnold. 1932a. “Trends in Business Administration.” Economica 35: 45–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Plant, Arnold. 1932b. “Competition and Co-Ordination in Transport.” Journal of the Institute of Transport 13: 127–135.Google Scholar
Plant, Arnold. 1933. “The Structure of Competitive Industry by E. A. G. Robinson.” Economica 36: 34–37.Google Scholar
Plant, Arnold. 1934. “British Industries and Their Organisation by G. C. Allen.” Economic Journal 44: 127–130.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Plant, Arnold. 1935. “Enterprise Purpose and Profit. Essays on Industry by D. H. Macgregor.” Economica 2: 119–122.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Plant, Arnold. 1937. “Centralize or Decentralize?” In Plant, Arnold, ed., Some Modern Business Problems. A Series of Studies. London: Longmans, Green and Co., pp. 3–33.Google Scholar
Raffaelli, Tiziano. 2003. Marshall’s Evolutionary Economics. London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Raffaelli, Tiziano. 2009. “Industry and Trade Reconsidered.” History of Economic Ideas 17: 59–74.Google Scholar
Rees, John Morgan. 1922. Trusts in British Industry, 1914–1921. London: P.S. King & Sons.Google Scholar
Robertson, Dennis H. 1928. The Control of Industry. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Robinson, Austin. [1931] 1935. The Structure of Competitive Industry. London: Nisbet & Co.; Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press.Google Scholar
Robinson, Austin. 1934. “The Problem of Management and the Size of Firms.” Economic Journal 44: 242–257.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Salter, Arthur. 1921. Allied Shipping Control: An Experiment in International Administration. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Shove, Gerald F. 1930. “The Representative Firm and Increasing Returns.” Economic Journal 40: 94–116.Google Scholar
Swann, Dennis, O’Brien, Denis P., Maunder, W. Peter J., and Howe, W. Stewart. 1974. Competition in British Industry. Restrictive Practices Legislation in Theory and Practice. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd.Google Scholar