Liberal Socialism: An Effort at Common Ground

The paper reviews recent discussions of political economy in post-Keynesian economics and beyond. Crotty’s Keynes Against Capitalism and his revival of O’Donnell’s labelling Keynes a ‘Liberal Socialist’ are used as the focal point. Reactions to his position are assessed and related contributions set in the same context. Certain themes are identified to seek common ground. First, disputes are set against the subversion of Keynes’s theory and policy into ‘Keynesian’ economics. Second, Keynes handled very badly the class implications of his theory. Third, there is therefore a need, as O’Donnell urges, to make a ‘distinction … between a writer’s intellectual contributions and the conduct of his or her personal life’. Keynes’s interpretation (or presentation) of his theory is distinct from the substance of the theory itself. Fourth, and relatedly, ‘Socialism is a family of many variants’, again as O’Donnell observed. In addition, the assessment puts in front place the conflict between finance and industrial capital / the rentier economy. Theoretical advances are also put in the context of the contemporaneous political debate in Britain. The sum of the parts bolsters Crotty’s case that Liberal Socialism does well capture the political economy to which the General Theory leads.