Albert O. Hirschman

Albert Otto Hirschman (born the April 7th 1915 with Berlin) is a American economist of formation. Its multi-field research makes difficult its classification in one of the disciplines to which it contributed such as the economy, the political sciences or the Sociologie.

Biography

Hirschman was born in Berlin, Germany of Carl and Hedwig Marcuse Hirschman. It makes its studies with the French College of Berlin. To 16 years, it adheres to socialist Youths Democratic Social Parti (SPD) German with which it will be opposed, sometimes violently, with the Nazi S.

In 1933, after the takeover of Adolf Hitler, it leaves off Germany for the France, where it continues its higher learning with the École of the high commercial studies and with the Sorbonne, then with the the United Kingdom with the London School Economics. In 1936, it leaves in Spain to fight the Franquisme. Until 1938, it studies with the Université of Trieste, where it obtains its Doctorat economy and engages in the clandestine opposition to Benito Mussolini. Constrained with the emigration because of the laws anti-Jews, one finds it in a group of German and Italian volunteers of the French Army. After the signature of the armistice, it takes an active part in the protection and the exfiltration of people threatened by collaboration of the mode of Vichy with the journalist Varian Fry.

In December 1940, it itself is obliged to flee towards the the United States, where it obtains a research grant Rockefeller at the University of California, Berkeley (1941 - 1943). It will be made American citizen in 1943. Thereafter, it returns in North Africa to the service of the army of the United States (1943 - 1946) then works with the federal fund (1946 - 1952) for the economic rebuilding of the Europe under the aegis of the Marshall plan.

In 1952, it chooses to go to Colombia to be an economic council of the National Planning Council then starting from 1956, to advise in the private one. From return in the academic world, it obtains stations in the largest American universities, universities of Yale (1956 - 1958), Columbia (1958 - 1964), Harvard (1964 - 1974) and Princeton (1974 - 1985). In 1985, it takes its retirement and is named professor emeritus.

Research

Economy of the development

In 1958, Hirschman publishes a work on the economy of the development, The Strategy off Economic Development which will be one of the texts founder of this new research field. He affirms the specificity of the Developing country what leads it to reject the standard economic analysis to analyze these countries. This book fits in a trilogy in which Hirschman had the hope to celebrate , to sing the epopee of the development, its challenge, its drama, its size. In 1963, appears Journeys Toward Progress and in 1967, Development Projects Observed .

In its book of 1958, it presents its development strategies economic. The idea of unbalanced Croissance, which met an lively interest among the Developing country in the years 1960, there is formulated. Hirschman sees in the growth a succession of imbalances, because the growth appears initially in certain sectors or certain areas before extending to the remainder.

our aim must Be to keep alive rather than eliminate the disequilibria off which profits and roofing stones are let us symptons in has competitive economy. Yew the economy is to Be kept moving ahead, the task off development policy is to maintain tensions, disproportions, and disequilibria. That nightmare off equilibrium economics, the endlessly spinning cobweb, is the kind off mechanism we must assiduously look for ace year invaluable help in the development process. (The Strategy off Economic Development, p.66)

There exist connections between the industrial branches: in the case of connections upstream ( backward linkages ), the installation of an industry will create a request for inputs (or input , for example, auto industry needs steel); in the case of connections downstream ( forward linkages ), the product of an industry fear of becoming the factor of production of another industry (oil drilling allows the creation of a die of petrochemistry). He thus recommends to concentrate the efforts of investment on a number limited of sectors, which will have been selected for their domino effects, in order to create growing points. The key sectors will be heavy industry.

The Algérie launched out in the development of heavy industries (iron and steel industry, petrochemistry and transport infrastructures) between the end of the year 1960 and the beginning of the year 1980. In spite of a strong progression of its industrial production, this stragégie encountered many problems. This strategy of investment is expensive because the production requires to be subsidized as long as the purchasers cannot pay the true price. Moreover these projects were often oversize and the sectors of consumption of final goods and agriculture were forsaken making in particular pass Algeria of a statute of exporter to importer of food products.

At the time this concept to the idea balanced Croissance was opposed preached in particular by Rosenstein-Rodan, Nurkse, Arthur Lewis and Scitovsky.

Political economy

In 1970, it publishes its most known work, Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States . It shows that the individuals have at their disposal three choices to answer political repression: the exile ( exit ), the protest ( voice ) or collaboration ( loyalty ).

Rewards

Hirschman gained many prices, of which the price Talcott Parsons for social sciences in 1983 of the American academy of sciences, the price Toynbee 1997-98 and the medal Thomas Jefferson decreed by the company of American philosophy.

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