J.S.Mill and the Irish Land Question: From Irish Economic History to Coherent Socialism and Irish Historicism

Abstract

John Stuart Mill is regarded as the last representative of the classical school of political economy. However, in a variety of issues, he developed interesting and radical economic views. The Irish land question is one of the most characteristic cases of his transition from classical economic analysis to a liberal version of socialism. This article attempts to illustrate this transition by highlighting Mill’s pluralistic and historically specific political economy. This is achieved through the delineation of his views on the Irish land question indexing his Principles of Political Economy (1848), England and Ireland (1868) and his pamphlet Land Tenure Reform (1871). The article concludes that Mill’s heretic views regarding the Irish land question are associated with his transition towards socialist views and facilitated the emergence of the Irish historical school of the late nineteenth century.

Economic history into the perspective of economic thought and historiography: Between the Symplegade Manolis Manioudis

“…Especially the younger Mill, of the Essays on Some Unsettled Questions of Political Economy (1844), adopted an a-aprioristic account of economic phenomena which, in methodological terms, reintroduced the Cartesian epistemology in political economy regarding the relationship between the Self and the social world. On the other hand, through the "legalisation" of induction, and the extensive elaboration of history, he provided the essential sperms for the subsequent appearance of Irish (and English) Historicism (Manioudis, 2020). As Koot (1987, p. 10) points out, "Indeed, the economic views of Mill offered a significant opening for the heretical views of several of the historical economists".…”

J.S. Mill and the Indian land question: From the political economy of small proprietorship to the support of ryots and British Imperialism?

“…Last, the article attempts to show that Mill’s thoughts on the Indian land question (as on the Irish one) are associated with his radical views concerning the understanding of economic phenomena. As with Ireland (see inter alia De Mattos, 2020; Manioudis, 2020), Mill, in discussing land tenure relations in East India, stressed the importance of custom, culture and history in understanding economic phenomena and formatting (appropriate) economic policies. The case of India, among other cases, persuaded Mill that the English political economy is not an effective means of providing practical solutions to all other cases.…”