| Peter Klein | An illuminating passage from James Ridgeway’s 1968 book The Closed Corporation: American Universities in Crisis, a scathing critique of the university-military-industrial complex. Note the cameo by Jim March: [University of California officials Ralph W.] Gerard and [R. Dan] Tschirgi are computer fetishists who insist information is knowledge, and that the function of a [...]
| Peter Klein | Jeremy Freese to his fellow sociologists: Jeremy Lin’s favorite course at Harvard was Sociology 128: Methods of Social Science Research. Nevertheless, he majored in economics, so your department cannot staple his face to its “What Can You Do With A Sociology Major?” poster. (If you don’t get the headline, ask the [...]
| Peter Klein | Google’s ebookstore now contains deeply discounted versions of several Edward Elgar books (which are usually priced for library use), including my Elgar Companion to Transaction Cost Economics ($48) and the Foss-Klein product Entrepreneurship and the Firm: Austrian Perspectives on Economic Organization ($31.20). Nicolai’s greatest hits collection Knowledge, Economic Organization, and Property [...]
| Peter Klein | Brainstorming appears in many strategy, entrepreneurship, and leadership texts, often mentioned in passing with the implication that it’s a great tool for group decision-making. But the research literature suggests a more circumspect attitude. Indeed, this week’s New Yorker features an interesting and informative essay on some of the latest results: The underlying [...]