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WAR AND PEACE: ARTHUR CECIL PIGOU AS A PUBLIC INTELLECTUAL DURING WORLD WAR I

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 September 2020

Rogério Arthmar Open the ORCID record for Rogério Arthmar [Opens in a new window]  and
Michael McLure
Rogério Arthmar
Affiliation:
Rogério Arthmar, Department of Economics, Universidade Federal do Espírito Santo, Brazil, email: [email protected].
Michael McLure
Affiliation:
Michael McLure, Business School, University of Western Australia, Australia, email: [email protected].
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Abstract

This study reflects on Arthur Cecil Pigou’s role in public debate during the initial phase of the First World War over whether Britain should negotiate a peace treaty with Germany. Its main goal is to provide evidence that the “Cambridge Professor” framed his approach to this highly controversial issue from theoretical propositions on trade, industrial peace, and welfare that he had developed in previous works. After reviewing his contributions on these subjects, Pigou’s letter to The Nation in early 1915, suggesting an open move by the Allies towards an honorable peace with Germany, is presented along with his more elaborate thoughts on this same theme put down in a private manuscript. The negative reactions to Pigou’s letter are then scrutinized, particularly the fierce editorial published by The Morning Post. A subsequent version of Pigou’s plea for peace, delivered in his London speech late in 1915, is detailed, listing the essential conditions for a successful conclusion of the conflict. To come full circle, the paper recapitulates Pigou’s postwar considerations on diplomacy, free trade, and colonialism. The concluding remarks bring together the theoretical and applied branches of Pigou’s thoughts on war and peace.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of the History of Economic Thought , Volume 42 , Issue 4 , December 2020 , pp. 521 - 538
Copyright
© The History of Economics Society, 2020

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Footnotes

The authors thank the valuable comments from two JHET anonymous referees and the editor Pedro Garcia Duarte. Financial support from CNPq, grant number 305168/2015-0, is gratefully acknowledged.

References

REFERENCES

The Cambridge Independent Press. 1915a. “The Terms of Peace. Professor Pigou Urges Moderate Policy. Spirited Debate at Union.” 12 March, p. 2.Google Scholar
The Cambridge Independent Press. 1915b. “Professor Pigou’s Views Not Representative of Cambridge University.” 19 March, p. 6.Google Scholar
The Cambridge Independent Press. 1915c. “Professor A. C. Pigou Thinks German People Have Been Punished Enough. Amazing Peace Proposal.” 3 December, p. 2.Google Scholar
The Cambridge Magazine. 1915. “Professor Pigou and Peace.” 13 March, p. 336.Google Scholar
The Chronicle. 1915. “Editorial.” 13 February, p. 8.Google Scholar
The Devon and Exeter Gazette. 1915. “Our London Letter.” 19 February, p. 3.Google Scholar
The Morning Post. 1915a. “The Policy of Dane-Geld.” 15 February, p. 6.Google Scholar
The Morning Post. 1915b. “Professorial Pedantry.” 26 November, p. 6.Google Scholar
The Sheffield Daily Independent. 1915. “When Peace Terms Are Stated.” 13 February, p. 4.Google Scholar
The Times. 1914. “The Pursuit of the Germans.” 15 September, Issue 40636, p. 9.Google Scholar
The Times. 1915. “More Peace Talk.” 1 February, Issue 40766, p. 9.Google Scholar
The Times. 1950. “Mr. H. A. Gwynne.” 27 June, Issue 51728, p. 8.Google Scholar
The Yorkshire Post. 1917. “A Peace Memorial to the Government.” 18 August, p. 6.Google Scholar
Arthmar, Rogério, and McLure, Michael. 2017a. “Cambridge Theories of Welfare Economics.” In Cord, Robert, ed., The Palgrave Companion to Cambridge Economics. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 51–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arthmar, Rogério, and McLure, Michael. 2017b. “Pigou on War Finance and Welfare.” History of Economics Review 66 (1): 2–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aslanbeigui, Nahid. 1992. “Foxwell’s Aims and Pigou’s Military Service: A Malicious Episode?” Journal of the History of Economic Thought 14 (1): 96–109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aslanbeigui, Nahid, and Oakes, Guy. 2015. Arthur Cecil Pigou. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aslanbeigui, Nahid, and Oakes, Guy. 2016. “The Great War and the Genesis of Pigou’s A Study of Public Finance.” Œconomia 6 (4): 487–513.Google Scholar
Angell, Ralph Norman. 1913. The Great Illusion: A Study of the Relation of Military Power to National Advantage. London: G.P. Putnam’s Son.Google Scholar
Brock, Peter, and Young, Nigel. 1999. Pacifism in the Twentieth Century. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press.Google Scholar
Brooke, Christopher N. L. 1993. A History of the University of Cambridge, Volume IV: 1870–1990. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Ceadal, Martin. 1980. Pacifism in Britain 1914–1945: The Defining of a Faith. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Coats, A. W. “Bob.” 1968. “Political Economy and the Tariff Reform Campaign of 1903.” Journal of Law and Economics 11 (1): 181–229.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Collard, David. 1981. “A.C. Pigou, 1877–1959”. In O’Brien, Dennis P., Presley, John R., eds., Pioneers of Modern Economics in Britain. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 105–139.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cook, Blanche W. 1972. “Democracy in Wartime: Antimilitarism in England and the United States, 1914–1918.” American Studies 13 (1): 51–68.Google Scholar
Cook, Simon J. 2009. The Intellectual Foundations of Alfred Marshall’s Economic Science. A Rounded Globe of Knowledge. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cunningham, Hugh. 1981. “The Language of Patriotism, 1750–1914.” History Workshop 12 (1): 8–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cunningham, William. 1915. “The Policy of the Allies.” The Nation (13 February): 619.Google Scholar
Deane, Phyllis. 2001. The Life and Times of J. Neville Keynes: A Beacon in the Tempest. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dickinson, Goldsworthy Lowes. 1914. The War and the Way Out. London: Chancery Lane Press.Google Scholar
Groenewegen, Peter. 1995. A Soaring Eagle: Alfred Marshall 1842–1924. Brookfied: Edward Elgar.Google Scholar
Hanak, Harry. 1963. “The Union of Democratic Control during the First World War.” Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 36 (94): 168–180.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hochschild, Adam. 2011. To End All Wars: How the First World War Divided Britain. London: Pan Macmillan.Google Scholar
Keynes, John Maynard. [1919] 1920. The Economic Consequences of the Peace. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Howe.Google Scholar
King, Elliot. 2014. “The Emergence of ‘Jingo’ and ‘Jingoism’ as Political Terms in Public Debate in Great Britain (1878–1880).” Journal of Historical Pragmatics 15 (2): 292–313.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Knight, Karen Lovejoy. 2018. A. C. Pigou and “Marshallian” Thought Style. London: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kumekawa, Ian. 2017. The First Serious Optimist: A. C. Pigou and the Birth of Welfare Economics. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Marshall, Alfred. 1914. “A Fight to a Finish.” Letter to The Times, Issue 40612, August 22, p. 7.Google Scholar
McLure, Michael. 2012. “A. C. Pigou’s Wealth and Welfare.” History of Economics Review 56 (1): 101–116.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pennell, Catriona. 2012. A Kingdom United: Popular Responses to the Outbreak of the First World War in Britain and Ireland. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1904. The Riddle of the Tariff. London: R. Brimley Johnson.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1905. Principles and Methods of Industrial Peace. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1912. Wealth and Welfare. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1915a. “A Plea to the Statement of the Allied Terms.” The Nation (6 February): 590–591.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1915b. Terms of Peace. Cambridge: Marshall Library of Economics, A. C. Pigou Papers.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1915c. “The Policy of Dane-Geld. A Reply from Professor Pigou.” The Morning Post (23 February): 6.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1916. “The Conditions of a Permanent Peace.” War and Peace 3 (28): 54–55.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1920. The Economics of Welfare. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1921. Political Economy of War. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1935. Economics in Practice: Six Lectures on Current Issues. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1952. Essays in Economics. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1965. Essays in Applied Economics. London: Frank Cass.Google Scholar
Rae, John. 1970. Conscience & Politics: The British Government and the Conscientious Objector to Military Service 1916–1919. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Robbins, Keith. 2002. The First World War. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Russell, Bertrand. 1915. “Letter to the Editor.” The Nation (13 February): 619.Google Scholar
Shields, Robert Alexander. 1965. “Imperial Reaction to the Fielding Tariff of 1897.” The Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science 31 (4): 524–537.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, Samuel Hood. 1915. “The Policy of Dane-Geld.” The Morning Post (26 February): 6.Google Scholar
Swanwick, Helena L. M. 1924. Builders of Peace Being a Ten Years’ History of the Union of Democratic Control. London: Swarthmore.Google Scholar
Wallace, Stuart. 1988. War and the Image of Germany. British Academics 1914–1918. Edinburgh: John Donald.Google Scholar
Winch, Donald. 2015. “Keynes and the British Academy.” The Historical Journal 57 (3): 751–771.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wyse, William. 1915. “Letter to the Editor.” The Nation (13 February): 619.Google Scholar
The Cambridge Independent Press. 1915a. “The Terms of Peace. Professor Pigou Urges Moderate Policy. Spirited Debate at Union.” 12 March, p. 2.Google Scholar
The Cambridge Independent Press. 1915b. “Professor Pigou’s Views Not Representative of Cambridge University.” 19 March, p. 6.Google Scholar
The Cambridge Independent Press. 1915c. “Professor A. C. Pigou Thinks German People Have Been Punished Enough. Amazing Peace Proposal.” 3 December, p. 2.Google Scholar
The Cambridge Magazine. 1915. “Professor Pigou and Peace.” 13 March, p. 336.Google Scholar
The Chronicle. 1915. “Editorial.” 13 February, p. 8.Google Scholar
The Devon and Exeter Gazette. 1915. “Our London Letter.” 19 February, p. 3.Google Scholar
The Morning Post. 1915a. “The Policy of Dane-Geld.” 15 February, p. 6.Google Scholar
The Morning Post. 1915b. “Professorial Pedantry.” 26 November, p. 6.Google Scholar
The Sheffield Daily Independent. 1915. “When Peace Terms Are Stated.” 13 February, p. 4.Google Scholar
The Times. 1914. “The Pursuit of the Germans.” 15 September, Issue 40636, p. 9.Google Scholar
The Times. 1915. “More Peace Talk.” 1 February, Issue 40766, p. 9.Google Scholar
The Times. 1950. “Mr. H. A. Gwynne.” 27 June, Issue 51728, p. 8.Google Scholar
The Yorkshire Post. 1917. “A Peace Memorial to the Government.” 18 August, p. 6.Google Scholar
Arthmar, Rogério, and McLure, Michael. 2017a. “Cambridge Theories of Welfare Economics.” In Cord, Robert, ed., The Palgrave Companion to Cambridge Economics. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 51–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arthmar, Rogério, and McLure, Michael. 2017b. “Pigou on War Finance and Welfare.” History of Economics Review 66 (1): 2–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aslanbeigui, Nahid. 1992. “Foxwell’s Aims and Pigou’s Military Service: A Malicious Episode?” Journal of the History of Economic Thought 14 (1): 96–109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aslanbeigui, Nahid, and Oakes, Guy. 2015. Arthur Cecil Pigou. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aslanbeigui, Nahid, and Oakes, Guy. 2016. “The Great War and the Genesis of Pigou’s A Study of Public Finance.” Œconomia 6 (4): 487–513.Google Scholar
Angell, Ralph Norman. 1913. The Great Illusion: A Study of the Relation of Military Power to National Advantage. London: G.P. Putnam’s Son.Google Scholar
Brock, Peter, and Young, Nigel. 1999. Pacifism in the Twentieth Century. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press.Google Scholar
Brooke, Christopher N. L. 1993. A History of the University of Cambridge, Volume IV: 1870–1990. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Ceadal, Martin. 1980. Pacifism in Britain 1914–1945: The Defining of a Faith. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Coats, A. W. “Bob.” 1968. “Political Economy and the Tariff Reform Campaign of 1903.” Journal of Law and Economics 11 (1): 181–229.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Collard, David. 1981. “A.C. Pigou, 1877–1959”. In O’Brien, Dennis P., Presley, John R., eds., Pioneers of Modern Economics in Britain. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 105–139.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cook, Blanche W. 1972. “Democracy in Wartime: Antimilitarism in England and the United States, 1914–1918.” American Studies 13 (1): 51–68.Google Scholar
Cook, Simon J. 2009. The Intellectual Foundations of Alfred Marshall’s Economic Science. A Rounded Globe of Knowledge. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cunningham, Hugh. 1981. “The Language of Patriotism, 1750–1914.” History Workshop 12 (1): 8–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cunningham, William. 1915. “The Policy of the Allies.” The Nation (13 February): 619.Google Scholar
Deane, Phyllis. 2001. The Life and Times of J. Neville Keynes: A Beacon in the Tempest. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dickinson, Goldsworthy Lowes. 1914. The War and the Way Out. London: Chancery Lane Press.Google Scholar
Groenewegen, Peter. 1995. A Soaring Eagle: Alfred Marshall 1842–1924. Brookfied: Edward Elgar.Google Scholar
Hanak, Harry. 1963. “The Union of Democratic Control during the First World War.” Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 36 (94): 168–180.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hochschild, Adam. 2011. To End All Wars: How the First World War Divided Britain. London: Pan Macmillan.Google Scholar
Keynes, John Maynard. [1919] 1920. The Economic Consequences of the Peace. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Howe.Google Scholar
King, Elliot. 2014. “The Emergence of ‘Jingo’ and ‘Jingoism’ as Political Terms in Public Debate in Great Britain (1878–1880).” Journal of Historical Pragmatics 15 (2): 292–313.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Knight, Karen Lovejoy. 2018. A. C. Pigou and “Marshallian” Thought Style. London: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kumekawa, Ian. 2017. The First Serious Optimist: A. C. Pigou and the Birth of Welfare Economics. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Marshall, Alfred. 1914. “A Fight to a Finish.” Letter to The Times, Issue 40612, August 22, p. 7.Google Scholar
McLure, Michael. 2012. “A. C. Pigou’s Wealth and Welfare.” History of Economics Review 56 (1): 101–116.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pennell, Catriona. 2012. A Kingdom United: Popular Responses to the Outbreak of the First World War in Britain and Ireland. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1904. The Riddle of the Tariff. London: R. Brimley Johnson.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1905. Principles and Methods of Industrial Peace. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1912. Wealth and Welfare. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1915a. “A Plea to the Statement of the Allied Terms.” The Nation (6 February): 590–591.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1915b. Terms of Peace. Cambridge: Marshall Library of Economics, A. C. Pigou Papers.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1915c. “The Policy of Dane-Geld. A Reply from Professor Pigou.” The Morning Post (23 February): 6.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1916. “The Conditions of a Permanent Peace.” War and Peace 3 (28): 54–55.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1920. The Economics of Welfare. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1921. Political Economy of War. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1935. Economics in Practice: Six Lectures on Current Issues. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1952. Essays in Economics. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Pigou, Arthur Cecil. 1965. Essays in Applied Economics. London: Frank Cass.Google Scholar
Rae, John. 1970. Conscience & Politics: The British Government and the Conscientious Objector to Military Service 1916–1919. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Robbins, Keith. 2002. The First World War. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Russell, Bertrand. 1915. “Letter to the Editor.” The Nation (13 February): 619.Google Scholar
Shields, Robert Alexander. 1965. “Imperial Reaction to the Fielding Tariff of 1897.” The Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science 31 (4): 524–537.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, Samuel Hood. 1915. “The Policy of Dane-Geld.” The Morning Post (26 February): 6.Google Scholar
Swanwick, Helena L. M. 1924. Builders of Peace Being a Ten Years’ History of the Union of Democratic Control. London: Swarthmore.Google Scholar
Wallace, Stuart. 1988. War and the Image of Germany. British Academics 1914–1918. Edinburgh: John Donald.Google Scholar
Winch, Donald. 2015. “Keynes and the British Academy.” The Historical Journal 57 (3): 751–771.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wyse, William. 1915. “Letter to the Editor.” The Nation (13 February): 619.Google Scholar