The Theory of Business Enterprise

by Thorstein Veblen1904book

References and Quotes

Reference

A New Collectivism

The new republic we were driving toward, according to Croly, bore little resemblance to either a republic or a democracy. It was to be an apolitical universe, a new utopia of engineers and skilled administrators, hinted at by Bellamy, spun out further by Veblen in The Engineers and the Price System, and The Theory of Business Enterprise. A federal union of worldwide scope was the target, a peculiar kind of union of the sort specified in Cecil Rhodes’ last wills, which established the Rhodes Scholarships as a means to that end. Politics was outdated as a governing device. Whatever appearances of an earlier democratic republic were allowed to survive, administrators would actually rule. A mechanism would have to be created whereby administrators could be taught the new reality discreetly so that continuity and progress could be assured. De Tocqueville’s nightmare of an endlessly articulating, self-perpetuating bureaucracy had finally come to life. It was still in its infancy, but every sign pointed to a lusty future.

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Reference

Plato’s Guardians

Paraphrased from The Theory of Business Enterprise:

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Quote

Used in: Plato’s Guardians

For a theoretical inquiry into the course of civilized life as it runs in the immediate present, therefore, and as it is running into the proximate future, no single factor in the cultural situation has an importance equal to that of the business man and his work. (p. 16)

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