If the University of Chicago Press had listened to one of its reader’s reports, it might not have published one of its best-selling books of all time. The story of how Chicago came to issue The Road to Serfdom, by the Austrian scholar F.A. Hayek, in 1944 is provided in a new definitive edition coming out this month.
As The Road to Serfdom, a seminal volume in modern libertarian thought, was wending its way to publication in Britain, three American university presses turned it down. Chicago decided to go ahead despite a review from a prominent economist at the university who said it wouldn’t sell. The original print run was gone in a month, and Chicago went on to sell more than 350,000 copies over the years. Some 600,000 more were distributed in condensed form via Reader’s Digest, and the book has been translated into more than 20 languages.
The new edition includes the 1933 memorandum in which Hayek laid out what would become the thesis of his attack on central economic planning: that the fascism rearing its head in Europe did not represent, as often argued, the final throes of failed capitalism, but the prelude to tyranny. It also includes the forewords to the first- and 50th-anniversary editions of the book, essays on its publication history, and the original readers’ reports from Frank H. Knight and Jacob Marschak.
F.A. Hayek, the London School of Economics and Political Science: Nothing could be more superficial than to consider the forces which dominate the Germany of today as reactionary — in the sense that they want a return to the social and economic order of 1914. The persecution of the Marxists, and of democrats in general, tends to obscure the fundamental fact that National Socialism is a genuine socialist movement, whose leading ideas are the final fruit of the antiliberal tendencies which have been steadily gaining ground in Germany since the later part of the Bismarckian era, and which led the majority of the German intelligentsia first to “socialism of the chair” and later to Marxism in its social-democratic or communist form. (Memorandum on Nazi-Socialism, spring of 1933)
Frank H. Knight, University of Chicago: From the standpoint of desirability of publishing the book in this country, I may note some grounds for doubt. The author is an Austrian refugee, a very able economist, who has been a professor at the London School of Economics since the middle 30s. He writes from a distinctly English point of view, and frequently uses the expression “this country” with that reference. While there is some treatment of American conditions, and citation of American writings, this is secondary in scope and emphasis. This fact in itself might limit the appeal in “this country” to a fairly cultivated, even academic, circle of readers. Moreover, the whole discussion is pitched at a quite high intellectual and scholarly level and the amount of knowledge of Central European conditions and history assumed is rather large for even the educated American audience. It is hardly a “popular” book from this point of view.
In addition, there are limitations in connection with the treatment itself, both as to the theoretical and the historical argument. In the latter connection, the work is essentially negative. It hardly considers the problem of alternatives, and inadequately recognizes the necessity, as well as political inevitability, of a wide range of governmental activity in relation to economic life in the future. It deals with only the simpler fallacies, unreasonable demands, and romantic prejudices which underlie the popular clamor for governmental control in place of free enterprise. ...
In sum, the book is an able piece of work, but limited in scope and somewhat one-sided in treatment. I doubt whether it would have a very wide market in this country, or would change the position of many readers. (Reader’s Report, December 10, 1943)
Jacob Marschak, University of Chicago: The current discussion between advocates and adversaries of free enterprise has not been conducted so far on a very high level. Hayek’s book may start in this country a more scholarly kind of debate.
The book will appeal to friends of free enterprise and give them new material; Hayek’s interpretation of the modern English scene (labor and industrial monopolist driving jointly toward a collective economy) will be new to all American readers except those who have read or listened to William Benton’s impressions; while Hayek’s German background enables him to give new support to the contention that socialism is the father of Nazism.
Those who are not convinced in advance of Hayek’s thesis will probably learn from his argument even more than those who are. Hayek (Chapter IV) has a wholesome contempt for the quasi-scientific method of “trends,” “waves of tomorrow.” Those who love planning because they love the inevitable will, perhaps, after reading Hayek revise either their faith or their tastes. Perhaps they will start to think in terms of ends and means instead of in prophecies.
It is true that Hayek himself gives little food for such concrete thinking. ...
His thinking is somewhat sharper, just because it is more abstract. Hayek’s style is readable and occasionally inspiring.
This book cannot be bypassed. (Reader’s Report, December 20, 1943)
Milton Friedman, University of Chicago: The fall of the Berlin Wall, the collapse of communism behind the Iron Curtain, and the changing character of China have reduced the defenders of a Marxian-type collectivism to a small, hardy band concentrated in Western universities. Today, there is wide agreement that socialism is a failure, capitalism a success. Yet this apparent conversion of the intellectual community to what might be called a Hayekian view is deceptive. While the talk is about free markets and private property — and it is more respectable than it was a few decades ago to defend near-complete laissez-faire — the bulk of the intellectual community almost automatically favors any expansion of government power so long as it is advertised as a way to protect individuals from big bad corporations, relieve poverty, protect the environment, or promote “equality.” (Introduction to the 1994 edition)
SOURCES CITED IN THIS COLUMN
Memorandum on Nazi-Socialism spring of 1933
Reader’s Report, December 10, 1943
Reader’s Report, December 20, 1943
Introduction to the 1994 edition
http://chronicle.com Section: The Chronicle Review Volume 53, Issue 30, Page B4