ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book provides an extended statement of Alfred Marshall’s objectives for political economy and an analysis of the technical and ideological orthodoxy which their pursuit imposed. The initial uncertainty about Henry Fawcett’s vacant post, then, was largely uncertainty as to whether Marshall would want it. Marshall disbelieved in a division of labour between different universities. He wanted economists to be trained in a body of theory which — without excessive grief — he recognised would be inaccessible to laymen. The organisations, the journals and the conferences were — by deliberate design — wide open to people with little training or knowledge. Marshall disbelieved in a division of labour between different universities. It followed that his main objectives for Cambridge economics were also his objectives when he turned his thoughts to the national scene.
