The Economic Consequences of the Peace

John Maynard Keynes

jan. 2005 · Transaction Publishers

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John Maynard Keynes, then a rising young economist, participated in the Paris Peace Conference in 1919 as chief representative of the British Treasury and advisor to Prime Minister David Lloyd George. He resigned after desperately trying and failing to reduce the huge demands for reparations being made on Germany. The Economic Consequences of the Peace is Keynes' brilliant and prophetic analysis of the effects that the peace treaty would have both on Germany and, even more fatefully, the world.

A popular lecturer of economics at Cambridge University and editor of the Economic Journal, Keynes made The Economic Consequences of the Peace a major step in his career. It was translated into a dozen languages and sold 100,000 copies in six months. Taken seriously even by those who were opposed to his claims, the book helped lift economics to a new, higher level of recognition and acceptance. This volume, with its insightful portraits of Lloyd George, Georges Clemenceau, and Woodrow Wilson, remains one of the great works of political economy of our time.

In a penetrating introduction written for this new edition, David Felix explores Keynes' reasons for writing the book, analyzes the author's arguments, and paints an historical backdrop of the period during which it was written.

"The most important economic document relating to World War I and its aftermath."--John Kenneth Galbraith

"This is a very great book. Mr. Keynes writes with a fullness of knowledge, an incisiveness of judgment, and a penetration into the ultimate causes of economic events. The style is like finely hammered steel. It is full of unforgettable phrases and of vivid portraits etched in the biting acid of a passionate moral indignation."--H. J. Laski, The Nation

John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946) was one of the greatest economic theorists of the twentieth century. He was chairman of the liberal journal of opinion The Nation and economics advisor for more than thirty years to British governments. He wrote several books, including his masterpiece, The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, the two-volume Treatise on Money, and A Tract on Monetary Reform.

David Felix is professor of history emeritus at the City University of New York. His books include Biography of an Idea: John Maynard Keynes and The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money and Keynes: A Critical Life.