ABSTRACT
As an economics instructor at Harvard, Talcott Parsons’ qualifications involved knowledge of German historical economics, not the quantitative economics central to colleagues. He soon studied Alfred Marshall and Vilfredo Pareto to fit in intellectually. He published essays on Marshall and, in 1934 and 1935, drafted long manuscripts on Pareto, influenced by, but differing from, the physiologist Lawrence Henderson and his circle, who advocated for Pareto’s ideas in social science. In 1937, Parsons included Pareto among four “recent European writers” in developing his voluntaristic theory of action in The Structure of Social Action. We examine three aspects of the relationship with Pareto in Parsons’ intellectual development.
1. Pareto emphasized, and Henderson underscored, complex systems of mutually dependent variables, inspiring Parsons’ emphasis on system formulations. Concepts of systems, equilibrium, and system functions followed.2. Pareto’s emphasis on non-logical or non-rational elements in society helped Parsons in “teasing out sociology from economics”, treating sociology as an analytical science within a comprehensive action theory. It also contributed to Parsons’ emphasis on values as central to the structure of society.3. Parsons first distinguished the concepts of the “action frame of reference” in a draft critique of Pareto. The critique depended on Pareto’s explicit formulations, encouraging Parsons’ later emphasis on explicit formal theory.
