US Capitalist Development Since 1776: Of, by and for Which People?

Douglas Dowd

Sept 2016 · Routledge

About this eBook

First Published in 1994. This comprehensive work views U.S. history through the analytical framework of the capitalist process. The highlights of the book are: it weaves together economic history with the history of economic ideas to give a new perspective on the contemporary connections between the economic and social processes; provides an analytical and historical explanation of capitalism as a socioeconomic system; discusses the past and present functioning of the business system, as 'a system of power', with emphasis on the 1970s, 1980s and the stagnation of the 1990s; analyses the relationship between structures of income, wealth and power and class, color and gender; and critically looks at the development and nature of the capitalist state.

About the author

Douglas Fitzgerald Dowd was born in San Francisco, California on December 7, 1919. During World War II, he was as a bomber pilot downed over the Pacific. He received a bachelor's degree in economics from the University of California, Berkeley in 1949 and later received a doctorate there. He taught at Cornell University from 1953 until 1970. He also taught at San Jose State University, the University of California, at Berkeley and at Santa Cruz, and the University of Modena and the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies Bologna Center in Italy. He wrote several books including U.S. Capitalist Development Since 1776: Of, by and for Which People? and Blues for America: A Critique, a Lament, and Some Memories. He died from congestive heart failure on September 8, 2017 at the age of 97.