Keynes’s “New Liberalism” Re-examined: From a Wide Perspective

This chapter deals with Keynes’s social philosophy. Through the General Theory he is too well-known for the “Keynesian Revolution” in the history of economics. And yet his activity as an economist occupies a small—albeit crucial—part of his career. He was a remarkable philosopher at a young age, and in his mid-thirties was a core member of the Treasury [of the British Empire] at the Paris Peace Conference, which negotiated over how devastated Europe after World War I should be rebuilt. Keynes resigned from his post, however, impeaching the Treaty of Versailles thus concluded. Thereafter, as an intellectual leader of the Liberal Party, he came to seek and advocate “New Liberalism” in the 1920s, energetically pursuing “persuasive activities” through his own bulletin and the mass media. A distinctive feature of these activities was that he actively and consciously interacted with European as well as American policymakers, consciously aiming to influence the public opinion. And most notably, Keynes’s major works of economics were written in parallel with such activities.