Abstract
Interwar economic events were a powerful source of inspiration for those economists who studied the relation between theory and current problems with a view to prescribing original solutions for policy authorities. If we examine the presidential addresses at the annual meetings of the American Economic Association (AEA), we see that the difficulty in reconciling past economic doctrines with the events which were profoundly disturbing the working of the economic system was frequently deplored. Many scholars denounced the inherited corpus of economic theories as inadequate and misleading. Others asked whether the causes of economic maladjustments could exclusively be grouped in the short term of cyclical fluctuations which characterized the transition between equilibrium positions. Still others, more pragmatically, believed that there were major imperfections in economic policies and the institutional framework which needed to be profoundly rethought and redesigned.1
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© 2009 Pier Francesco Asso and Luca Fiorito
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Asso, P.F., Fiorito, L. (2009). A Scholar in Action in Interwar America: John H. Williams on Trade Theory and Bretton Woods. In: Leeson, R. (eds) American Power and Policy. Archival Insights into the Evolution of Economics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230246140_8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230246140_8
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