George Orwell as a Public Choice Economist

Makovi, Michael (2015): George Orwell as a Public Choice Economist. Published in: American Economist , Vol. 60, No. 2 (1 November 2015): pp. 183-208.

Abstract

George Orwell is famous for his two final fictions, Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four. These two works are sometimes understood to defend capitalism against socialism. But as Orwell was a committed socialist, this could not have been his intention. Orwell's criticisms were directed not against socialism per se but against the Soviet Union and similarly totalitarian regimes. Instead, these fictions were intended as Public Choice-style investigations into which political systems furnished suitable incentive structures to prevent the abuse of power. This is demonstrated through a study of Orwell's non-fiction works, where his opinions and intentions are more explicit.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: Orwell, Public Choice, socialism, totalitarianism, Neoconservatism
• Subjects: B - History of Economic Thought, Methodology, and Heterodox Approaches > B2 - History of Economic Thought since 1925 > B24 - Socialist ; Marxist ; Sraffian; B - History of Economic Thought, Methodology, and Heterodox Approaches > B3 - History of Economic Thought: Individuals > B31 - Individuals; D - Microeconomics > D7 - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making > D72 - Political Processes: Rent-Seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior; P - Economic Systems > P2 - Socialist Systems and Transitional Economies > P20 - General; P - Economic Systems > P3 - Socialist Institutions and Their Transitions > P30 - General; Z - Other Special Topics > Z1 - Cultural Economics ; Economic Sociology ; Economic Anthropology > Z11 - Economics of the Arts and Literature

References

Bakunin, Mikhail. 1993. “The Capitalist System.” Ed. unknown, trans. compiled from various trans. by Maximoff and Stein. Champagne: Libertarian Labor Review, 1993 / Los Angeles: ICC, 1999. (Rpt. at <http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bakunin/capstate.html> [accessed: 4 April 2014])

Beichman, Arnold. 2003. “The Invitational at Columbia.” The Washington Times. March 31st. <http://archive.frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=18999> [accessed: 14 April 2014]

Bloom, Harold (ed.). 1987a. George Orwell's 1984. New York / New Haven / Philadelphia: Chelsea House.

Bloom, Harold. 1987b. “Introduction.” Pp. 1-7 in Bloom 1987a.

Bloom, Harold (ed.). 1987c. George Orwell: Modern Critical Views. New York: Chelsea House.

Bowker, Gordon. 2003. Inside George Orwell. New York / Houndsmills, Basingstroke, Hampshire, England: Palgrave Macmillan.

Buchanan, James M. 1979. “Politics Without Romance: A Sketch of Positive Public Choice Theory and Its Normative Implications.” The Logical Foundations of Constitutional Liberty. Indianapolis, Indiana: Liberty Fund, 1999: 45-59. (Rpt. from a lecture of 1979.)

Buchanan, James M. 1995. “Interview with James M. Buchanan.” The Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, Sept. 1st. <https://www.minneapolisfed.org/publications/the-region/interview-with-james-buchanan> [accessed: 9 January 2015]

Buchanan, James M. and Gordon Tullock. 1962. The Calculus of Consent: Logical Foundations of Constitutional Democracy. Michigan University Press.

Buchanan, James M. and Richard E. Wagner. 1977. Democracy in Deficit: The Political Legacy of Lord Keynes. Indianapolis, Indiana: Liberty Fund. (Rpt. 2000.)

Burgess, Anthony. 1978. “Ingsoc Considered.” Pp. 35-45 in Bloom 1987a. (Rpt. from Anthony Burgess. 1985. Hutchinson.)

Butler, Eamonn. 2012. Public Choice - A Primer. London: Institute of Economic Affairs <http://www.iea.org.uk/publications/research/public-choice-a-primer> [accessed: 22 July 2014].

Calder, Jenni. 1968. “Orwell's Post-War Prophecy.” Pp. 133-155 in Williams 1974. (Rpt. from Jenni Calder. Chronicles of Conscience. London: Seeker and Warburg, 1968)

Caplan, Bryan. Undated. “Anarchist Theory FAQ,” version 5.2. <http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/bcaplan/anarfaq.htm> [accessed: 1 April 2014].

Considine, John. 2006. “The Simpsons: Public Choice in the Tradition of Swift and Orwell.” Journal of Economic Education 37(2): 217-228.

Crossman, Richard (ed.). 1949. The God that Failed: A Confession. New York: Harper.

Crothers, Lane. 1994. “George Orwell and the Failure of Democratic Socialism: The Problem of Political Power.” Soundings: An Interdisciplinary Journal 77(3/4): 389-407.

Deutscher, Isaac. 1956. “1984–The Mysticism of Cruelty.” Pp. 119-132 in Williams 1974; pp. 332-343 in Howe 1982. (Rpt. from Isaac Deutscher. Heretics and Renegades. London: Hamish Hamilton, 1956.)

Eckstein, Arthur. 1985. “1984 and George Orwell's Other View of Capitalism.” Modern Age (March): 11-19. <http://www.unz.org/Pub/ModernAge-1985q1-00011> [accessed: 2 February 2014].

Fyvel, T. R. 1950. “A Writer's Life.” Pp. 377-391 in Howe 1982. (Orig. World Review, June 1950: 7-27.)

Greenblatt, Stephen J. 1965. “Orwell as Satirist.” Pp. 103-118 in Williams 1974. (Rpt. from Stephen J. Greenblatt. Three Modern Satirists. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1965).

Guild, Nicholas. 1975. “In Dubious Battle: George Orwell and the Victory of the Money-God.” Pp. 77-84 in Bloom 1987c. (Rpt. from Modern Fiction Studies 21(1), Spring 1975.)

Gwartney, James. 2012. “What Should We Be Teaching in Basic Economics Courses?” Journal of Economic Education 43(3): 300-7.

Gwartney, James. 2013. “The Public Choice Revolution in the Textbooks.” Cato Policy Report May/June <http://www.cato.org/policy-report/mayjune-2013/public-choice-revolution-textbooks> [accessed: 22 July 2014].

Gwartney, James and Rosemarie Fike. 2014. “Public Choice versus the Benevolent Omniscient Planner Model of Government: Evidence from Principles Textbooks.” Working paper at <http://mailer.fsu.edu/~jgwartne/garnet-jgwartne/Documents/Gwartney%20Fike%20Public%20Choice.pdf> [accessed: 22 July 2014]. Published as Gwartney and Fike 2015.

Gwartney, James and Rosemarie Fike. 2015. “Public Choice, Market Failure, and Government Failure in Principles Textbooks.” Journal of Economic Education 46(2): 207-218.

Harrington, Michael. 1982. “Nineteen Eighty-Four Revisited.” Pp. 429-439 in Howe 1982.

Hayek, F. A. 1997. Socialism and War, edited by Bruce Caldwell. Chicago: Chicago University Press.

Hayek, F. A. 2007 [1944]. The Road to Serfdom, edited by Bruce Caldwell. Chicago: Chicago University Press.

Hill, P. J. 1999. “Public Choice: A Review.” Faith and Economics 34: 1-10. <https://www.gordon.edu/ace/pdf/Hill=F&E34.pdf> [accessed: 11 Jan. 2015]

Holcombe, Randall G. 2012. “Make Economics Policy Relevant: Depose the Omniscient Benevolent Dictator.” Independent Review 17(2): 165-176.

Hollander, Paul. 1997 [1981]. Political Pilgrims: Western Intellectuals in Search of the Good Society. New Brunswick: Transaction. (Expanded from orig. subtitled Travels of Western Intellectuals to the Soviet Union, China, and Cuba, 1928-1978. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981.)

Hollander, Paul. 2006. The End of Commitment: Intellectuals, Revolutionaries, and Political Morality. Chicago: Dee, 2006.

Howe, Irving. 1956. “1984: History as Nightmare.” Pp. 320-332 in Howe 1982. (Orig. The American Scholar 25(2):193-207.)

Howe, Irving. 1962. “The Fiction of Anti-Utopia.” Pp. 303-310 in Howe 1982.

Howe, Irving (ed.). 1982. Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four: Texts, Sources, Criticism. 2nd. ed. New York: Harcourt.

Howe, Irving. 1983. “1984: Enigmas of Power.” Pp. 95-107 in Bloom 1987a. (Rpt. from Irving Howe, 1984 Revisited: Totalitarianism in our Century. Harper & Row.)

Jefferson, Thomas. 1798. “The Kentucky Resolution of 1798.” <http://www.constitution.org/cons/kent1798.htm> [accessed: 11 Jan. 2015]

Kamm, Oliver. (2004). “It takes an intellectual to find excuses for Stalinism.” The Times. July 23rd. <https://web.archive.org/web/20080516090127/http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/thunderer/article460555.ece> [accessed: 14 April 2014]

Kateb, George. 1966. “The Road to 1984.” Political Science Quarterly 81(4): 564-580 (Dec).

Koestler, Arthur. 1940. Darkness at Noon. Trans. Daphne Hardy. London: Cape.

Lemieux, Pierre. 2004. “The Public Choice Revolution.” Regulation 27(3): 22-29.

López, Rolando A. 2011. “The Despot and the Poet: On the Duty of the Intellectual.” The Reader's Response 20: 83-103.

Madison, James. 1788. The Federalist, no. 51. New York, The Independent Journal, Feb. 6th. <http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa51.htm> [accessed: 2 February 2014]

McElroy, Wendy. 2000. “A Webb of Lies.” The Free Market 18:2. <http://www.wendymcelroy.com/mises/webboflies.html> [accessed: 17 July 2014].

Meyers, Jeffrey (ed.). 1975. George Orwell: The Critical Heritage. New York / London: Routledge. (Rpt. 1997, 2002.)

Mueller, Dennis C. 2003. Public Choice III. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Newsinger, John. 1999. Orwell's Politics. Houndsmills, Basingstroke, New Hamphsire and New York: Palgrave.

Novak, Michael. 1986. Will it Liberate? Questions about Liberation Theology. Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press.

Nozick, Robert. (1974), Anarchy, State, and Utopia, New York: Basic Books.

Orwell, George. 1931a. “The Spike.” Pp. 8-16 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. The Adelphi, April 1931.)

Orwell, George. 1931b. “A Hanging.” Pp. 16-20 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. The Adelphi, Aug. 1931; rpt. The New Savoy, 1946.)

Orwell, George. 1933. Down and Out in Paris and London. London: Gollancz.

Orwell, George. 1935a. Burmese Days. Pp. 75-309 in Orwell 2009. (Orig. London: Gollancz, 1935.)

Orwell, George. 1935b. A Clergyman's Daughter. Pp. 311-538 in Orwell 2009. (Orig. London: Gollancz, 1935.)

Orwell, George. 1935c. “Catastrophic Gradualism.” Pp. 923-937 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. C. W. Review, November 1935.)

Orwell, George. 1936a. “Shooting an Elephant.” Pp. 42-49 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. New Writing 2, Autumn 1936.)

Orwell, George. 1936b. Keep the Aspidistra Flying. Pp. 725-938 in Orwell 2009. (Orig. London: Gollancz, 1936.)

Orwell, George. 1937a. “Spilling the Spanish Beans.” Pp. 66-73 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. New English Weekly, 29 July and 2 Sept. 1937.)

Orwell, George. 1937b. The Road to Wigan Pier. London: Gollancz.

Orwell, George. 1939a. “Review of Russia under Soviet Rule by N. de Basily.” Pp. 108-111 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. New English Weekly, 12 Jan. 1939.)

Orwell, George. 1939b. “Review of Communism and Man by F. J. Sheed.” Pp. 111-113 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. Peace News, 27 Jan. 1939.)

Orwell, George. 1939c. “Such, Such Were the Joys.” Pp. 1291-1333 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. date unknown but approx. 1939 - June 1948.)

Orwell, George. 1940. “Inside the Whale.” Pp. 211-249 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. 11 Mar. 1940)

Orwell, George. 1941a. “The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius.” Pp. 291-348 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. 19 Feb. 1941.)

Orwell, George. 1941b. “Literature and Totalitarianism.” Pp. 360-364 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. broadcast 21 May 1941.)

Orwell, George. 1941c. “Will Freedom Die with Capitalism?” The Left News. April 1941: 1682-1685. (Rpt. in The Complete Works of George Orwell, edited by Peter Davison. London: Secker & Warburg, 1998: 458-464)

Orwell, George. 1942. “Looking Back on the Spanish Civil War.” Pp. 431-451 in Orwell 2002.

Orwell, George. 1944a. “Review of The Machiavellians by James Burnham.” Pp. 523-526 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. Manchester Evening News, 20 Jan. 1944.)

Orwell, George. 1944b. “Review of The Road to Serfdom by F.A. Hayek / The Mirror of the Past by K. Zilliacus.” Pp. 117-119 in The Collected Essays, Journalism, and Letters of George Orwell [CEJL] [volume] III. New York: Harcourt, 1968. (Rpt. pp. 149-150 in Complete Works, publ. 2000-2002 by Secker and Warburg, vol. 6.) (Orig. The Observer, 9 April 1944.)

Orwell, George. 1944c. “Letter to Noel Willmett.” Pp. 232-233 in George Orwell: A Life in Letters, edited by Peter Davison. New York / London: Liveright, 2013 (rpt. from 2010). (Orig. 18 May 1944. Rpt. in Howe 1982: 279-281).

Orwell, George. 1944d. “The English People.” Pp. 608-648 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. written 1944, publ. 1947.)

Orwell, George. 1945a. Animal Farm. Pp. 1-73 in Orwell 2009. (Orig. Secker and Warburg, 1945; rpt. 1987.)

Orwell, George. 1945b. “The Freedom of the Press (Animal Farm).” Pp. 888-897 in Orwell 2002. (According to Orwell [2002: 888], orig. London, 17 Aug. 1945 and New York, 26 Aug. 1946. But according to “Appendix I” of the 2000 Penguin standalone edition of Animal Farm, this essay was proposed by Orwell as a preface to Animal Farm and first published by Bernard Crick as “How the essay came to be written,’ in The Times Literary Supplement, 15 Sept. 1972.)

Orwell, George. 1946a. “The Prevention of Literature” Pp. 931-945 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. Polemic, Jan. 1946; The Atlantic Monthly, Mar. 1947. Rpt. in Howe 1982: 262-273)

Orwell, George. 1946b. “James Burnham and the Managerial Revolution.” Pp. 1052-1073 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. Polemic 3, 1 May 1946.)

Orwell, George. 1946c. “Why I Write.” Pp. 1079-1085 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. Gangrel, no. 4, summer 1946. Rpt. in Howe 1982: 243-248.)

Orwell, George. 1946d. “As I Please 63.” Pp. 1135-1139 in Orwell 2002. (Orig. Tribune, 29 Nov. 1946.)

Orwell, George. 1947. “Preface to the Ukranian Edition of Animal Farm.” Pp. 1210-1215 in Orwell 2002. (Trans. from the Ukranian, Mar. 1947; orig. English lost.)

Orwell, George. 1949a. Nineteen Eighty-Four. Pp. 939-1186 in Orwell 2009. (Orig. Secker and Warburg, 1949; rpt. 1987. See further in Orwell 1949b.)

Orwell, George. 1949b. “Letter to Francis A. Henson.” P. 502 in The Complete Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell [CEJL] [volume] IV: In Front of Your Nose 1945-1950, edited by Sonia Orwell and Ian Angus. New York: Harcourt, 1968. (According to the note in CEJL IV: 502, orig.16 June 1949. CEJL IV 502 also notes that “Nineteen Eighty-Four was published in London by Secker & Warburg on 8 June 1949 and in New York by Harcourt, Brace on 13 June 1949.” The letter is rpt. in its entirety in Meyers [1975: 24] and in Howe [1982: 286-287]; and partially quoted in Newsinger [1999: 122], in Howe [1956: 324 note], and in Howe [1983: 107]).

Orwell, George. 2000 [1938]. Homage to Catalonia. London: Penguin Classics, 2000. (Rpt. from London: Penguin, 1962. Orig. Martin Secker and Warburg, 1938, in turn rpt. in 1986.)

Orwell, George. 2002. Essays, edited by John Carey. Everyman's Library. New York: Knopf. (Based on Complete Works, Vols. 10-20, publ. 2000-2002 by Secker and Warburg.)

Orwell, George. 2009. The Complete Novels of George Orwell. (No editor listed.) Penguin Modern Classics. London: Penguin. (Orig. Secker and Warburg, 1976; rpt. Penguin Books, 1983; rpt. Penguin Classics, 2000.)

Otis, James. 1763. The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved. Boston. <http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/2335> [accessed 20 May 2015]

Patai, Daphne. 1984. “Gamesmanship and Androcentrism in Nineteen Eighty-Four.” Pp. 47-85 in Bloom 1987a. (Rpt. from Daphne Patai. The Orwell Mystique. University of Massachusetts Press, 1984.)

Rackman, Emanuel. 2000. One Man's Judaism. Jerusalem: Gefen. (Orig. Tel Aviv: Greenfield, 1970.)

Rahv, Philip. 1949. “The Unfuture of Utopia.” Pp. 310-316 in Howe 1982. (Orig. Partisan Review 16:7 [1949]. Rpt. Philip Rahv. Literature and the Sixth Sense. Boston: Houghton, 1969. Rpt. pp. 13-20 in Bloom 1987c.)

Richman, Sheldon. 2011. “From 1944 to Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Tale of Two Books.” The Freeman. The Foundation for Economic Education, Dec. 16th (rpt. from vol. 59, Dec. 2009). <http://www.fee.org/the_freeman/detail/from-1944-to-nineteen-eighty-four> [accessed: 2 February 2014]

Riggenbach, Jeff. 2010. “The Brilliant but Confused Radicalism of George Orwell.” June 24th. <http://mises.org/daily/4513> [accessed: 21 February 2013]

Roazen, Paul. 1978. “Orwell, Freud, and 1984.” Pp. 19-34 in Bloom 1987a. (Orig. Virginia Quarterly 54(4) (Autumn).)

Roback, Jennifer. 1985. “The Economic Thought of George Orwell.” The American Economic Review 75(2): 127-132. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/1805583> [accessed: 2 February 2014]

Shughart II, William F. 2008. “Public Choice.” The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics. Library of Economics and Liberty. <http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/PublicChoice.html> [accessed: 12 January 2015]

Sillen, Samuel. 1949. “Maggot-of-the-Month.” Pp. 297-299 in Howe 1982. (Orig. Masses and Mainstream 1949.)

Simmons, Randy T. 2011. Beyond Politics: The Roots of Government Failure. Oakland, CA: Independent Institute.

Smith, Adam. 1904 [1776]. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. Ed. Edwin Canaan. London: Methuen, 1904. (Rpt. from 1776.) <http://www.econlib.org/library/Smith/smWN.html> [accessed: 2 February 2014]

Stevens, Joe B. 1993. The Economics Of Collective Choice. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1993.

Symons, Julian. 2000. “Introduction.” Pp. v-xiii in George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia. London: Penguin Classics, 2000 (orig. 1989).

Trilling, Lionel. 1952. “George Orwell and the Politics of Truth: Portrait of the Intellectual as a Man of Virtue.” Commentary, March 1952: 218-227 <http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/Orwell_09242007.pdf> [accessed: 2 April 2014]. (Rpt. as the intro. to Orwell, Homage to Catalonia. New York: Harcourt, 1952.)

Tullock, Gordon. 1971. “Public Decisions as Public Goods.” Journal of Political Economy 79(4): 913-918.

Tullock, Gordon. 1976. The Vote Motive. London: Institute of Economic Affairs. (Rpt. 2006.) <http://www.iea.org.uk/publications/research/the-vote-motive> [accessed: 22 July 2014].

Tullock, Gorden, Arthur Seldon, and Gordon L. Brady. 2002. Government Failure: A Primer in Public Choice. Washington, DC: Cato Institute.

Wain, John. 1963. “George Orwell as a Writer of Polemic.” Pp. 89-102 in Williams 1974; pp. 357-367 in Howe 1982. (Orig. pp. 180-193 in John Wain, Essays on Literature and Ideas. London: Macmillan, 1963.)

Walsh, James. 1956. “George Orwell.” Pp. 212-216 in Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four: Text, Sources, Criticism, edited by Irving Howe, 1st ed. New York: Harcourt, 1963.

Webb, Sidney and Beatrice. 1935. Soviet Communism: A New Civilization? London: Longmans Green. (The 2nd and 3rd ed. of 1941 and 1944 omitted the “?” from the title.)

West, Anthony. 1956. Untitled article. Orig. New Yorker, 28 January 1956: 86-92. Rpt. in Meyers (1975: 71-79).

White, Richard. 2008. “George Orwell: Socialism and Utopia.” Utopian Studies 19(1): 73-95.

Williams, Raymond (ed.). 1974. George Orwell: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

Yergin, Daniel and Joseph Stanislaw. 2002. The Commanding Heights: The Battle for the World Economy. New York: Free Press, 2002. (Updated edition from the original by same publisher, 1998, with the previous subtitle of “The Battle Between Government and the Marketplace That Is Remaking the Modern World.”)

Winter, Ella. 1933. Red Virtue: Human Relationships in the New Russia. London: Gollancz, 1933.