ABSTRACT
In 1909, when Max Weber was planning a handbook in economics called Grundriss in Sozialökonomik (Outline of Social Economics), he asked Friedrich von Wieser to write about economic theory and his pupil Joseph Schumpeter to write a piece on the history of economic theory. Wieser’s part was published in 1914 as Theorie der Gesellschaftlichen Wirtschaft (Social Economics, 1927). Schumpeter’s contribution was published the same year (1914) as Epochen der Dogmen-und Methodengeschichte (Economic Doctrine and Method, 1954). Eventually, Weber was to make a contribution of his own to this project; Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft, published posthumously in 1922 (Economy and Society, 1978). When Weber, in 1918 was offered a chair in economics in Vienna, he was asked to give his opinion on the candidates to another chair in theoretical economics. Weber unhesitatingly recommended Joseph Schumpeter to the post – the ‘greatest theoretical talent’, who is also ‘an excellent teacher’ (quoted in Hennis, 1991: 49).
