Studies on the Abuse and Decline of Reason: Text and Documents

by F. A. Hayek, Bruce Caldwell (Editor)

Overview

F. A. Hayek never published the grand project he conceived in a letter to Fritz Machlup in 1939. As described in the introduction, this work would “incorporate intellectual history, methodology, and an analysis of social problems, all aimed at shedding light on the consequences of socialism.” He told Machlup that “a series of case studies should come first, . . . leading to the fundamental scientific principles of economic policy and ultimately to the consequences of socialism,” and the work would “form the basis of a systematic intellectual historical investigation of the fundamental principles of the social development of the last hundred years.” (Introduction, p. 1)

Studies on the Abuse and Decline of Reason collects the essays that were to be the foundation of that work. The essay “Individualism: True and False” was written as the introduction to the work. “Scientism and the Study of Society” provides the case studies, followed by two essays of intellectual history: “The Counter-Revolution of Science” (his study of the history of scientism in France) and “Comte and Hegel.”

Hayek did publish all the works found in this volume, but they had never been gathered in a single work as he originally conceived. Editor Bruce Caldwell has provided translations where they were absent and has revised and corrected the text, and his introduction tells “the story of Hayek’s greatest unfinished piece of work.”

F. A. Hayek (1899–1992), recipient of the Medal of Freedom in 1991 and co-winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1974, was a pioneer in monetary theory and one of the principal proponents of classical liberal thought in the twentieth century. He taught at the London School of Economics, the Universityof Chicago, and the Universityof Freiburg.

Bruce Caldwell is Research Professor of Economics and the Director of the Center for the History of Political Economy at Duke University. He is the current general editor of The Collected Works of F. A. Hayek.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780865979079
Publisher:	Liberty Fund, Incorporated
Publication date:	04/16/2018
Series:	The Collected Works of F. A. Hayek
Pages:	344
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.81(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

F. A. Hayek (1899-1992), recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1991 and co-winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1974, was a pioneer in monetary theory and a leading proponent of classical liberalism in the twentieth century. He taught at the University of Vienna, University of London, University of Chicago, and University of Freiburg.

Bruce Caldwell is research professor of economics and the director of the Center for the History of Political Economy at Duke University. He is the general editor of the Collected Works of F. A. Hayek series, also published by the University of Chicago Press. 

Table of Contents

Editorial Foreword      

Introduction     

Studies on the Abuse and Decline of Reason

Prelude                 Individualism: True and False           

Part One: Scientism and the Study of Society

One                      The Influence of the Natural Sciences on the Social Sciences           

Two                      The Problem and the Method of the Natural Sciences          

Three                    The Subjective Character of the Data of the Social Sciences

Four                      The Individualist and ‘Compositive’ Method of the Social Sciences  

Five                      The Objectivism of the Scientistic Approach

Six                        The Collectivism of the Scientistic Approach

Seven                    The Historicism of the Scientistic Approach 

Eight                     ‘Purposive’ Social Formations         

Nine                      ‘Conscious’ Direction and the Growth of Reason     

Ten                       Engineers and Planners        

Part Two: The Counter-Revolution of Science

Eleven                   The Source of the Scientistic Hubris: L’Ecole Polytechnique          

Twelve                  The “Accoucheur d’Idées”: Henri de Saint-Simon    

Thirteen                 Social Physics: Saint-Simon and Comte       

Fourteen               The Religion of the Engineers: Enfantin and the Saint-Simonians        

Fifteen                   Saint-Simonian Influence     

Sixteen                  Sociology: Comte and His successors          

Part Three: Comte and Hegel

Seventeen             Comte and Hegel    

Appendix: Related Documents

Some Notes on Propaganda in Germany (1939)          

Selected Correspondence, F. A. Hayek to Fritz Machlup (1940–41)   

Preface to the U. S. Edition (1952)      

Preface to the German Edition (1959)  

Acknowledgements     

Index