Translated by John Knapp. First edition in English. 8vo. xviii, 236 pp. Original red cloth, spine lettered in gilt, dust jacket (internally clean and unmarked; some trivial shelf wear to extremities of jacket with tiny nick to head of front panel, spine panel faintly toned, otherwise an excellent copy). Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1959.
The first English translation of the Hungarian economist János Kornai’s (1928-2021) doctorate dissertation submitted to the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in 1956. Despite the fact that it criticised many aspects of Hungarian economic planning, Korani’s dissertation was accepted by the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and published in Hungarian in March 1957, a notable achievement given the heavy curtailment of intellectual freedom following the failed uprising at the 1956. Korani contributed a new foreword to this English edition.
Kornai would go on to become one of the leading authorities on the planned economies of the Eastern Bloc.
