| Titre | Concilier liberté économique et justice sociale : Les solutions de Keynes | |
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| Auteur | Michel Herland | |
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Revue | Cahiers d'économie politique |
| Numéro | no 30-31, pintemps 1998 Keynes : économie et philosophie | |
| Page | 281-310 | |
| Résumé anglais |
According to Keynes, politics should aim at three different targets : economic efficiency, social justice and individual liberty. The first part of the paper analyses the meaning of each target and their combination. Economic efficiency is related to utilitarianism. Keynes is considered as utilitarian because he accepted the two following ideas : 1) the good is related to pleasures and utility, even if it cannot be strictly defined by these two words - 2) an action is right when it increases the happiness of the community. Besides, the second point, the principle of utility, insures that resources shall be efficiently used. Social justice bears on the reduction of unequalities. Unequalities are acceptable only if they contribute to economic development and to the improvement of the whole population. Finally, economic liberties appear as a cause of efficiency as well as a component of personal liberties.
The three targets have different degrees of priority. As long as the stage of abundancy is not reached, efficiency comes first, liberty second and social justice third. Full-employment matters, evidently, but is considered more as instrumental for the three preceeding goals rather than a goal in itself.
The second part deal with means. In The End of Laisser-Faire, Keynes defines the sphere of intervention of the State in terms of the collective goods. The list of the Agenda of the State may be found in other texts. After 1930 they include « moderate planning », a concept which fits in Keynes' general scheme of « liberal socialism ». In the long run, Keynes believed that « a somewhat comprehensive socialization of investment » and the « euthanasia of the rentier » - which refer to a much more radical socialism - would become unevitable. Source : Éditeur (via Persée) |
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| Article en ligne | http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/cep_0154-8344_1998_num_30_1_1223 |
