Wisconsin Institutionalism: John R. Commons and His Students

Abstract

This paper seeks to provide a close examination of the nature and history of the institutional economics that developed at the University of Wisconsin. There has been a significant amount of work done on the thinking of John R. Commons, but much less on the history of Wisconsin institutionalism more generally. The paper proceeds through an examination of the development of the Department of Economics at Wisconsin from the time of the hiring of Richard T. Ely in 1892; the faculty hired to the Department from the early 1900s through to Commons's retirement in 1933; the program of instruction offered, particularly in the late 1920s when the full complement of institutionalist faculty were present; and the areas of study and later careers of Commons's graduate students. It is argued that although Ely played a role in the development of Wisconsin institutionalism, it was Commons who became the center of graduate student work, and that the Department only took on its decidedly institutionalist character after the hiring of Commons and a number of his students as faculty. The program of study in the late 1920s was very heavily institutionalist in character with Commons providing a core course on value and valuation, and a notable emphasis in the fields of public utilities, labor economics, and statistics. Very little instruction was provided in neoclassical theory. Many of Commons's students went on to notable careers in the academic world or public service or both. Wisconsin students were heavily involved in labor legislation issues, and in the development and administration of social security. But a number of Commons's students went into academic careers, and many produced large numbers of PhD students themselves. The decline of Wisconsin-style institutionalism after World War II was not, as has been suggested, a result of Commons's students moving largely into non-academic careers, but of many other factors, including the rise of Keynesian economics, and the migration of what had been much of Wisconsin institutionalism into new schools of industrial relations.

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