Galbraith, John Kenneth 1908-

GALBRAITH, JOHN KENNETH 1908-

Economist and teacher

Criticizing Materialism

John Kenneth Galbraith made his name in 1958 with the publication of The Affluent Society, a critical look at the "conventional wisdom" that dominated American economic and social life at the time. The book was a rarity, a scholarly work on economics that received main-stream attention and became a best-seller. Its popularity was even more surprising, perhaps, considering its stinging indictment of modern materialist society, which, Galbraith claimed, champions private wealth and productivity over public needs.

Early Life

Galbraith was born to Scottish-Canadians on the shore of Lake Erie near the United States-Canada border. He graduated from an agricultural branch of the University of Toronto and then pursued advanced degrees in economics from the University of California. In 1934 he accepted an offer to teach at Harvard University. For the next ten years he worked at a variety of scholarly positions; he also became involved in government service. In 1941 he was in Washington, D.C., as deputy administrator of the Office of Price Administration, a position which, as John S. Gambs reports, "made him virtually the economic czar of the United States until he left in 1943."

Political Roles

In 1952 Galbraith played an important role in the presidential election as a speechwriter for Democratic candidate Adlai Stevenson, along with literary critic Bernard De Voto and playwright Archibald MacLeish. After Stevenson lost the election to Dwight D. Eisenhower, Galbraith found a role in the Republican administration as the chairman of the Democratic Advisory Council. In the late years of the decade he campaigned actively for John F. Kennedy, and in 1960, after Kennedy's successful presidential bid, he was named U.S. ambassador to India.

Inspired by India

Galbraith had first visited India in 1956, and his fascination with the country partly inspired his most famous work, The Affluent Society. In a desperately poor society such as India's, almost all of the products consumed are urgently needed—food, clothing, and shelter. As a society becomes more prosperous, many unnecessary goods are produced as well, and they must be purchased in order to maintain the country's high level of production and employment. In affluent societies, Galbraith claimed, demand followed production, and people bought products because they were persuaded to do so by advertisers.

Social Imbalance

This commitment to private affluence, Galbraith argued, led to social imbalance: social programs and environmental concerns were ignored, and production of more cars and televisions was viewed as social progress. Only by adopting a new standard of productivity, one that led to real social progress, could balance be achieved. Critics of The Affluent Society argued that Galbraith was attempting to deny a basic American social freedom: free Americans were first and foremost free to buy things. But many of Galbraith's ideas had an impact on the policies of Presidents Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. Urban renewal and conservationism, concepts that were to become part of Johnson's Great Society, were all advocated in The Affluent Society.

Later Work

After the Kennedy years Galbraith returned to scholarly activity. He has traveled and written extensively over the last several decades, using Harvard as his home base. His varied literary output includes several memoirs of his eventful life. Although conventional wisdom has remained firmly entrenched, Galbraith has continued to kick at some of the props supporting it.

Sources:

John Kenneth Galbraith, A Life in Our Times (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1981);

John S. Gambs, John Kenneth Galbraith (Boston: Twayne, 1975).