Keynes and the British academy

Abstract

This account of Keynes's relationship with the British Academy begins with his early, perhaps premature, nomination as a Fellow and its sequel, an initial rejection by the Academy on political grounds in 1920. The event became linked with the failure of his professorial colleague at Cambridge, Arthur Cecil Pigou, to be elected until 1927 on grounds that Keynes regarded as equally discreditable to the Academy. It was certainly one of the less edifying examples of Cambridge infighting. But having relented in his original decision not to allow his name to be put forward again Keynes was elected in 1929. The article deals with Keynes's subsequent participation in the affairs of the Academy, especially his part in nominating Beatrice Webb, the first woman to be elected to the Academy in 1930; and his contrasting failure to secure the election of Joan Robinson in the 1940s. The article is based mainly on archival sources and makes use of material drawn from the Academy's archive on the section that housed economists and economic historians between its foundation in 1902 and Keynes's death as its chairman in 1946. The article concludes by contrasting the part Keynes played in the Academy with his more dominant role as secretary to the Royal Economic Society.