ABSTRACT
Re-statements of economic theory, of which we are offered so many, are only occasionally needed, as factual knowledge advances and institutions change. The rest of us should be economic scientists, content steadily to lay stone on stone in building the structure of ordered knowledge. A customary feature of contemporary scholarship is to begin a study by appropriately defining the terms and concepts to be employed. The broad facts of history are relatively well known, thanks to the expansion of our knowledge about post-war conditions on account of the establishment of reasonably uniform national income accounting procedures. The technology available changes over time, the world economy to which a particular nation must accommodate varies, and economic knowledge has expanded, with consequential effects in economic management. Variations in natural endowment and the impact of human intervention both affect the opportunities available to the inhabitants.
