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The article presents discussions by economists on some papers that are published in the May 1, 1970 issue of the journal "American Economic Review." The author states that the university is a part of the existing socioeconomic system with specific functions, among which that are mentioned by authors of papers published in the present issue of the journal, to socialize students as wage-workers is only one. Another is to inculcate into the student, a potential future leader, member of the intellectual elite, teacher of future students, precisely the point of view that underlies economics curriculum. Authors of those papers follow with iron logic that the university is not going to accept, let alone promote, an alternative curriculum, which begins by rejecting, or calling into question all basic institutions, relations and results of the existing system. It is true that under stress, such as that which developed on many campuses last year, powers-that-be will make concessions and often will promise more concessions. It is significant that economics department refused to recognize it and academic authorities denied permission for it to abandon the grading system, which authors criticized so effectively in their papers.

This article examines the economic, social and political forces determining the concrete amount of education needed by all people. In his paper Torsten Husén states that in estimating the degree to which people can be educated, people are primarily dealing with a socio-politico-economic problem rather than a pedagogic one. Perhaps the main problem raised by Husén's paper is not whether the existing empirical information support a reactionary or progressive educational pattern, but the significance of empirical findings as such. The large research work done by Husén shows, by large, that the arguments put forward against the educability of people and in favor of selective or restrictive pattern of education are not, pedagogically, valid. On the other hand, it is certain that once a progressive educational policy is formed at the political level, the implementation of it need research directed to these specific ends. There are some principal tendencies in a class society to repeat the existing division of work and modes of manpower utilization by limiting of education of some demographic groups and differentiating mechanically the knowledge transmitted to people.

Medical men in their handling of disease increasingly have recourse to "team-work." Various specialists each make their own diagnosis of the patient, and set out a corresponding course of treatment. It is for sociology (ill-equipped for the task though as yet it may be) to infuse the discussion and treatment of current ills with the quickening spirit of a synthetic science. As a modest contribution to such discussion of the Coal Crisis, the present studies are submitted, though of necessity preliminary and tentative. These studies open with a paper which attempts what may be called a sociological orientation of the Coal Question. Here the coal crisis is viewed as symptom of a deep-seated malady in the body politic. This introductory paper is followed by four others, which sample the manifold contributions to public welfare in general, and the coal question in particular, to be drawn from the physico-chemical sciences, from biology, and from the simpler aspects of social science. The Coal Crisis is but the concentrated expression, and virulent outbreak, of a crisis in Great Britain's national life.

The Warsaw Conference on the Marxian theory of Development centered on two related questions; (1) is there in Marxism a distinctively Marxian theory of development? (2) if there is, what guidance can it give today to countries at varying levels or stages of development? In his paper "The Marxian Theory of Development and Socialist Economic Policy," professor J.S. Berliner, held that the sociologist Karl Marx was primarily concerned with the process of capitalistic development. The Marxian doctrine, Berliner contended, applied primarily to fully developed capitalistic economies, their fundamental internal contradictions being supposed to lead inevitably to their bursting asunder and to their supersession by socialism. The title of the paper which professor W. Brus presented jointly with professor K. Laski was "Essentials of the Marxian Approach to Problems of Economic Development." For them the fundamental category of the Marxian theory of economic development was perhaps one which is both social and economic and is summed up in the expression mode of production. It would appear that Marxism does not furnish a set of formulae for development, from which practitioners can easily find out what to do in specific cases. Marxism does seem, however, to offer a box of tools, a set of canons, a method indicating how one might go about formulating what one wants to do by way of development.

Cybernation is defined as the combination of the computer and the automated self-regulating machine. Enthusiasm for cybernation is likewise giving rise to myths, which may harden unless they are given critical attention. The new myths are somewhat reinforced by technocratic thinking which is often ill informed along economic and sociological lines. As myths, some of the newer convictions, which are developing, are also an outcropping of what has come to be called the Triple Revolution. In evaluating the assumptions of cybernation here the author is not declaring either that they are in error or that they are beyond the bounds of possibility. What the author wishes to maintain in this paper is that if these assumptions remain untempered by institutional realities and by some new and necessary conceptual considerations of an economic nature, they will not prove very serviceable for the task of managed social change. Furthermore, if these assumptions remain unguided by an appropriate social philosophy, a cybercultural credo will remain at best programmatic. Unless detailed blueprints for various forms of needed devotees of cybernation can work out social change, the cybercultural revolution will never enter the realm of Realpolitik. The excuse for this paper, then, will be the effort to examine critically the excesses of enthusiasm, which characterize those who are now marching under the banner of cybernation, and to suggest some critical remedies, which are in order.