抄録
Nobuo Okishio (1927-2003) and Michio Morishima (1923-2004) belonged to the same generation. Both of them started their study of economics through Hicks's Value and Capital. Because of Okishio's conversion from Hicksian to Marxian economics, their academic path once separated in the mid-1950s. However, since the late-1960s Morishima undertook a reformulation of Marxian value theory. In the 1970s He also accepted Keynes's principle of effective demand as the proper description of contemporary capitalism where the Say's Law does not hold true anymore. The purpose of this paper is to overview Okishio's and Morishima's economics and highlight some important characteristics common to them. Since the author has already made a detailed argument on Okishio in a previous essay, this paper puts focus on Morishima's economics. Morishima regarded theories as a set of tools which should be selected depending on features of the economy to be investigated. Thus his economics has no universal "principle". While making substantial contributions to the elaboration of the general equilibrium theory, he was well aware that adherence to strict generality would be theoretically barren. In his view the scope of analysis based on optimization is limited also by the fact that "sociological factors" play crucial roles in labor market. He showed keen interest in concrete processes of market transactions and emphasized the necessity to analyze the movement of temporary equilibrium prices over periods. Morishima's theoretical transition in late 1960's was twofold. In terms of analytical method he adopted von Neumann's framework. More importantly, in terms of the basic understanding of capitalism, he embraced Keynes. Morishima indicated that equalization of the return rates of durable goods is incompatible with full employment of factors unless the Say's Law is assumed. In connection with this, he sought to construct a price theory which could explain both prices determined by auction and prices set by firms based on the full-cost principle. In Capital and Credit Morishima tried to incorporate into his theory the roles of entrepreneurs and bankers as co-creators of "production possibility set". Okishio and Morishima were outstanding internal critics of the theories upon which they themselves had relied. Okishio's reformulation of Marx's economics contains fundamental criticism against it. Morishima's early works include pertinent insight into the limits of Walrasian-Hicksian approach. hey saw economy as a time-consuming circular process accompanied with complicated interrelations between its various agents and sectors. One of the reasons why they were not impressed with Sraffa might be that they had already established circulation-based view of economy. On Marxian value and exploitation theory, there were no substantial disagreement between them. Rejecting the Say's Law clearly, Okishio and Morishima built their theory on the principle of effective demand. They regard the movement of capital stocks as one of basic factors determining the dynamics of capitalist economy. However, advocacy of Keynes brought disharmony into their theoretical systems. Okishio's Keynesian short-term theory is not consistently connected with Marxian longterm theory. There remained a large gap between Morishima's vision of "the anti-Say's Law system" and his formalized Neumann-type model. Clarification of these common features would be significant as a preparation for more comprehensive comparison of their economics.
