This 1991 book is a selection of Jacques Drèze's work over the last decade on the topics of lasting unemployment, stagflation and unused capacity. At the theoretical level, the author has contributed to the formulation and analysis of general equilibrium models which allow for price rigidities and excess supply and lend themselves to econometric implementation, thus represents an attempt to integrate micro- and macroeconomics, and to use theory for empirical and policy purposes.

Originally published in 1977, this book is a companion to Professor Morishima's book Marx's Economics which was published in 1973. As he did so successfully with Marx, Morishima intended with this book to change the standard assessment of his subject's contribution to the development of economic thought. The standard view was that Walras provided, in the second half of the nineteenth century, the basis for general equilibrium theory. He was thus regarded as a microeconomist, a founder of marginalism; but Morishima (...) argues that, while Walras certainly made important contributions in that area, it is his attempt to build a macroeconomics on that foundation that should be regarded as his main achievement. This book will provoke great interest amongst all economists and advanced students of economic theory and its history. (shrink)