Modern macroeconomics: its origins, development and current state

More than a decade after the publication of the critically acclaimed A Modern Guide to Macroeconomics, Brian Snowdon and Howard Vane have produced a worthy successor in the form of Modern Macroeconomics. Thoroughly extended, revised and updated, it will become the indispensable text for students and teachers of macroeconomics in the new millennium.

The authors skilfully trace the origins, development and current state of modern macroeconomics from an historical perspective. They do so by thoroughly appraising the central tenets underlying the main competing schools of macroeconomic thought as well as their diverse policy implications. To reflect the important developments which have occurred in macroeconomics over the final decades of the twentieth century, they also survey the burgeoning literature on the ‘new political macroeconomics’ and ‘economic growth’. The book includes insightful chapters on the Post Keynesian and Austrian schools by Paul Davidson and Roger Garrison, and is enlivened by interviews with leading economists such as Robert Skidelsky, James Tobin, Milton Friedman, Robert Lucas Jr, Edward Prescott, Gregory Mankiw, Alberto Alesina, Robert Solow and Paul Romer. The volume also contains an extensive bibliography of over 1,300 publications which highlights the key titles recommended for further student reading.

Erudite, accessible and lucidly written, this book is both a stimulating introduction and excellent guide to the controversies and diversity of modern macroeconomic debates. It will prove invaluable for students on undergraduate and postgraduate courses who want to understand as well as simply learn about macroeconomics. It is also a book that many teachers and lecturers will want on their shelves.