Stuart Chase was an American economist and engineer trained at MIT. His writings covered topics as diverse as
general semanticsGeneral semantics is a program begun in the 1920's that seeks to regulate the evaluative operations performed in the human brain. After partial program launches under the trial names "human engineering" and "humanology," Polish-American originator Alfred Korzybski fully launched the program as...
and physical economy. His hybrid background of engineering and economics places him in the same philosophical camp as R. Buckminster Fuller. Chase's thought was shaped by
Henry GeorgeHenry George was an American writer, politician and political economist, who was the most influential proponent of the land value tax, also known as the "single tax" on land...
,
Thorstein VeblenThorstein Bunde Veblen, born Torsten Bunde Veblen was an American economist and sociologist, and a leader of the so-called institutional economics movement...
and
Fabian socialismThe Fabian Society is a British socialist movement, whose purpose is to advance the principles of democratic socialism via gradualist and reformist, rather than revolutionary, means. It is best known for its initial ground-breaking work beginning late in the 19th century and continuing up to World...
. Chase spent his early political
career supporting "a wide range of reform causes: the single tax, women's suffrage,
birth controlBirth control is an umbrella term for several techniques and methods used to prevent fertilization or to interrupt pregnancy at various stages. Birth control techniques and methods include contraception , contragestion and abortion...
and
socialismSocialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...
." Chase's early books The Tragedy of Waste (1925)
and Your Money's Worth (1928) were notable for their criticism of corporate
advertisingAdvertising is a form of communication used to persuade an audience to take some action with respect to products, ideas, or services. Most commonly, the desired result is to drive consumer behavior with respect to a commercial offering, although political and ideological advertising is also common...
and their advocacy of
consumer protectionConsumer protection laws designed to ensure fair trade competition and the free flow of truthful information in the marketplace. The laws are designed to prevent businesses that engage in fraud or specified unfair practices from gaining an advantage over competitors and may provide additional...
.
Although not a Marxist, Chase admired the
planned economyA planned economy is an economic system in which decisions regarding production and investment are embodied in a plan formulated by a central authority, usually by a government agency...
of the
Soviet UnionThe Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
, being impressed with it after a 1927 visit. Chase
stated that "The Russians, in a time of peace, have answered the question of what an economic system is for". It has been suggested that he was the originator of the expression
a New DealThe New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the United States between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the U.S. Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt's responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians call...
, which became identified with the economic programs of American president Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He had a cover story in The New Republic entitled "A New Deal for America", during the week that Roosevelt gave his 1932 presidential acceptance speech promising a new deal, but whether Roosevelt's speechwriter Samuel Rosenman saw the magazine is not clear.
His 1938 book The Tyranny of Words was an early (perhaps the earliest, predating
HayakawaSamuel Ichiye Hayakawa was a Canadian-born American academic and political figure of Japanese ancestry. He was an English professor, and served as president of San Francisco State University and then as United States Senator from California from 1977 to 1983...
) and influential popularization of
Alfred KorzybskiAlfred Habdank Skarbek Korzybski was a Polish-American philosopher and scientist. He is remembered for developing the theory of general semantics...
's
general semanticsGeneral semantics is a program begun in the 1920's that seeks to regulate the evaluative operations performed in the human brain. After partial program launches under the trial names "human engineering" and "humanology," Polish-American originator Alfred Korzybski fully launched the program as...
.
Chase supported the
isolationistNon-interventionism, the diplomatic policy whereby a nation seeks to avoid alliances with other nations in order to avoid being drawn into wars not related to direct territorial self-defense, has had a long history in the United States...
movement and was against US entry in
World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, advocating
this position in his 1939 book The New Western Front.
In the 1960s, Chase lent his support to the
Johnson administration'sLyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...
Great SocietyThe Great Society was a set of domestic programs in the United States promoted by President Lyndon B. Johnson and fellow Democrats in Congress in the 1960s. Two main goals of the Great Society social reforms were the elimination of poverty and racial injustice...
policies.
Quotes
Chase is famous for the quote at the end of his book A New Deal, "Why should Russians have all the fun remaking a world?" — a reference to the "socialist experiment" in the
USSRThe Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
.
He is quoted in
S. I. HayakawaSamuel Ichiye Hayakawa was a Canadian-born American academic and political figure of Japanese ancestry. He was an English professor, and served as president of San Francisco State University and then as United States Senator from California from 1977 to 1983...
's Language in Thought and Action as having said, "Common sense is that which tells us the world is flat."
Neo-socialist tendencies
Chase compiled a list of 18 neo-socialist tendencies. These tendencies, listed below, can be found on pages 95 and 96 of
The Road We Are Traveling.
1. A strong, centralized government.
2. An executive arm growing at the expense of the legislative and
judicial arms.
3. The control of banking, credit and security exchanges by the government.
4. The underwriting of employment by the government, either through armaments or public works.
5. The underwriting of social security by the government – old-age pensions,
mothers’ pensions, unemployment insurance, and the like.
6. The underwriting of food, housing, and medical care, by the government.
7. The use of deficit spending to finance these underwritings.
8. The abandonment of gold in favor of managed currencies.
9. The control of foreign trade by the government.
10. The control of natural resources.
11. The control of energy sources.
12. The control of transportation.
13. The control of agricultural production.
14. The control of labor organizations.
15. The enlistment of young men and women in youth corps devoted to health,
discipline,community service and ideologies consistent with those of the
authorities.
16. Heavy taxation, with special emphasis on the estates and incomes of the rich.
17. Control of industry without ownership.
18. State control of communications and propaganda.
Selected bibliography
- The road we are traveling, 1914-1942: guide lines to America's future as reported to the Twentieth Century Fund. Twentieth Century Fund; 1942
- Your Money's Worth: A study in the waste of the consumer's dollar (with Frederick J. Schlink ). 1928
- The Tragedy of Waste 1925
- Men and Machines 1929
- The Nemesis of American Business 1931
- A New Deal. New York, The Macmillan company, 1932.
- The New Western Front (with Marian Tyler). Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1939.
- A Generation of Industrial Peace;: Thirty years of labor relations at Standard Oil Company 1941
- The Proper Study of Mankind Harper & Brothers 1948.
- Roads to Agreement: Successful methods in the science of human relations 1951
- For This We Fought;: Guide lines to America's future as reported to the Twentieth Century Fund
- Danger—Men Talking! a Background Book on Semantics and Communication
- Rich Land, Poor Land
- The Proper Study of Mankind Harper Colophon Books, 1956
- American Credos 1962
- Guides to Straight Thinking, With 13 Common Fallacies. New York: Harper, 1956.
- The Economy of Abundance
- The Tyranny of Words. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co, 1938.
Books about Chase
Vangermeersch, Richard G. J. The Life and Writings of Stuart Chase (1888–1985): From an Accountant's Perspective. Amsterdam: Elsevier JAI, 2005. ISBN 978-0762312139
External links