A long wave goodbye

Kondrat'ev and the Conjuncture institute, 1920–28

Bibliographic Data

ID12300383
AuthorsVincent Barnett (0000-0001-6657-5171, University of Birmingham, corresponding author)
Year1995
Volume47
Issue3
Pages413-441
Publication date1995-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueEurope Asia Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0966-8136 • E-ISSN: 1465-3427
PublisherRoutledge (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/09668139508412265
OpenAlexW1976339944
LanguageEN
Citations received7
References cited11

IF THERE IS ONE RUSSIAN ECONOMIST active during the period of the Soviet Union's existence who is universally known to all Western economists today, that person is Nikolai Dmitrievich Kondrat'ev.2 His name is forever linked to the idea of long waves in capitalist economic development, an idea which has since been expounded by Marxist and non-Marxist economists such as Ernest Mandel and Joseph Schumpeter, and which found new impetus during the world economic crisis which began in the 1970s. Long waves are 50-60 year economic cycles revealed in price levels and trade statistics which appear to provoke social upheavals and technical innovations and which, according to Kondrat'ev, were caused by periodic renewal of basic capital goods. However, while the idea of long waves has been thoroughly investigated ever since it was first proposed, Kondrat'ev himself has received little attention over the years. Perhaps this is because Western economists and economic historians do not usually understand Russian, Russian scholars were discouraged from pursuing this topic for political reasons until 1987, and Western Sovietologists were reluctant to focus on a figure whose 'big idea' had little to do with the USSR.3 This article attempts to partially redress this imbalance by focusing on Kondrat'ev and the institute which he created in Moscow in the 1920s specially for the study of market fluctuations, the Conjuncture Institute.4 The Conjuncture Institute is relevant not only to those interested in Soviet history. It was one of the first academic institutes in the world to be devoted specifically to the study of market conjuncture, and certainly the first which grew in non-capitalist surroundings. The Soviet Conjuncture Institute should be placed with, for example, Wesley Mitchell's National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), which pioneered empirical description of the business cycle in the USA in the first half of this century, and Michal Kalecki's work in the Institute for Research on Business Cycles and Prices in Warsaw between 1929 and 1936, where a macroeconomic theory of

Economic history · Marxist philosophy · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Redress · Sociology · Soviet union · Economic Theory and Institutions · Economic Theory and Policy · History · Law

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