View source for John Kenneth Galbraith

{{short description|Canadian-American economist and diplomat (1908–2006)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=August 2022}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| honorific_suffix    = {{post-nominals|country=CAN|OC|size=100%}}
| image               = JK_Galbraith_1962.jpg
| caption             = Ambassador John Kenneth Galbraith in 1962
| order               = 7th
| ambassador_from     = United States
| country             = India
| term_start          = April 18, 1961
| term_end            = July 12, 1963
| president           = [[John F. Kennedy]]
| predecessor         = [[Ellsworth Bunker]]
| successor           = [[Chester Bowles]]
| birth_date          = {{birth date|1908|10|15}}
| birth_place         = [[Iona Station, Ontario]], Canada
| death_date          = {{death date and age|2006|04|29|1908|10|15}}
| death_place         = [[Cambridge, Massachusetts]], U.S.
| citizenship         = {{unbulleted list | Canada | United States (from 1937)}}
| spouse              = {{Marriage|[[Catherine Galbraith|Catherine Merriam Atwater]]|1937}}
| children            = 4, including [[Peter Galbraith|Peter]] and [[James K. Galbraith|James]]
| module              = {{Infobox Economist
|embed=yes
| school_tradition = [[Institutional economics]]
| institution     = {{unbulleted list | [[Harvard University]] | [[Princeton University]] | University of California, Berkeley}}
| alma_mater      =
| influences      = {{cslist|[[Thorstein Veblen|Veblen]]|[[Adam Smith|Smith]]|[[Karl Marx|Marx]]|[[John Maynard Keynes|Keynes]]|[[Michał Kalecki|Kalecki]]|[[Gardiner Means|Means]]|[[Adolf A. Berle|Berle]]}}
| contributions   = {{cslist|[[Countervailing power]]|[[technostructure]]|[[conventional wisdom]]}}
| awards          = {{unbulleted list | [[Lomonosov Gold Medal]] (1993) | [[Officer of the Order of Canada]] (1997) | [[Presidential Medal of Freedom]] (2000) | [[Padma Vibhushan]] (2001) |}}
}}
| education           = {{unbulleted list | [[Ontario Agricultural College]] ([[Bachelor of Science in Agriculture|BSAg]]) | [[University of California, Berkeley]] ([[Master of Arts|MA]], [[PhD]])}}
}}
{{liberalism US|intellectuals}}
'''John Kenneth Galbraith'''{{efn|Pronounced {{IPAc-en|ɡ|æ|l|ˈ|b|r|eɪ|θ}} {{respell|gal|BRAYTH|'}}.}} {{post-nominals|country=CAN|OC}} (October 15, 1908 – April 29, 2006), also known as '''J K Galbraith''' or '''Ken Galbraith''', was a Canadian-American economist, diplomat, public official, and intellectual. His books on economic topics were bestsellers from the 1950s through the 2000s. As an economist, he leaned toward [[post-Keynesian economics]] from an [[institutional economics|institutionalist]] perspective.<ref>{{cite journal|author=Keller, Robert R. |title=Keynesian and Institutional Economics: Compatibility and Complementarity? |journal=Journal of Economic Issues|volume=17|issue=4 |year=1983|pages=1087–95|jstor=4225383|doi=10.1080/00213624.1983.11504189 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|author=Davidson, Paul |title=Galbraith and the Post Keynesians |journal=Journal of Post Keynesian Economics|volume=28|issue=1 |year=2005|pages=103–13|jstor=4225383}}</ref> He served as the deputy director of the powerful [[Office of Price Administration]] (OPA) during World War II in charge of stabilizing all prices, wages and rents in the American economy, to combat the threat of inflation and hoarding during a time of shortages and rationing, a task which was successfully accomplished.

Galbraith was a long-time [[Harvard]] faculty member and stayed with Harvard University for half a century as a professor of economics.<ref name="Harvard Gazette">{{cite web | url=http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2008/02/john-kenneth-galbraith/ | title=John Kenneth Galbraith | work=Harvard Gazette | date=February 7, 2008 | access-date=July 2, 2013 |author1=Marglin, Stephen A. |author2=Parker, Richard |author3=Sen, Amartya |author4=Friedman, Benjamin M.}}</ref> He was a prolific author and wrote four dozen books, including several novels, and published more than a thousand articles and essays on various subjects. Among his works was a trilogy on economics, ''[[American Capitalism]]'' (1952), ''[[The Affluent Society]]'' (1958), and ''[[The New Industrial State]]'' (1967).

Galbraith was active in [[History of the Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic Party politics]], serving in the administrations of [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]], [[Harry S. Truman]], [[John F. Kennedy]], and [[Lyndon B. Johnson]]. He served as [[United States Ambassador to India]] under the [[Kennedy administration]]. His political activism, literary output and outspokenness brought him wide fame during his lifetime.<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.economist.com/obituary/2006/05/04/john-kenneth-galbraith | title=John Kenneth Galbraith | newspaper=The Economist | date=May 4, 2006 | access-date= July 3, 2013}}</ref><ref name="thecrimson.com">{{cite web | url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2006/4/30/john-kenneth-galbraith-longtime-economics-professor/ |title= John Kenneth Galbraith, Longtime Economics Professor, Dies at 97 | work=Harvard Crimson|date=April 2006| access-date= July 3, 2013}}</ref> Galbraith was one of the few to receive both the World War II [[Medal of Freedom (1945)|Medal of Freedom]] (1946) and the [[Presidential Medal of Freedom]] (2000) for his public service and contributions to science.

==Life==
===Early life===
Galbraith was born on October 15, 1908, to Canadians of [[Scottish Canadian|Scottish]] descent, Sarah Catherine (Kendall) and Archibald "Archie" Galbraith, in [[Iona Station, Ontario]], Canada, and was raised in [[Dutton/Dunwich, Ontario|Dunwich Township, Ontario]].<ref>Galbraith, John Kenneth. ''The Scotch''. Toronto: Macmillan, 1964.</ref> He had three siblings: Alice, Catherine, and Archibald William (Bill). By the time he was a teenager, he had adopted the name Ken, and later disliked being called John.<ref name=Dunn2005>{{Cite journal|last1=Dunn |first1=Stephen P. |last2=Pressman |first2=Steven |year=2005 |title=The Economic Contributions of John Kenneth Galbraith |journal=Review of Political Economy |volume=17 |issue=2 |pages=161–209 |doi=10.1080/09538250500067254 |s2cid=153867413 |url=http://www.bib.uab.cat/socials/exposicions/galbraith/docs/dunn.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131129032112/http://www.bib.uab.cat/socials/exposicions/galbraith/docs/dunn.pdf |archive-date=November 29, 2013 }}</ref> Galbraith grew to be a very tall man, attaining a height of {{convert|6|ft|9|in|cm}}.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.harvardsquarelibrary.org/biographies/john-kenneth-galbraith/|title=John Kenneth Galbraith|date=August 16, 2012}}</ref>

His father was a farmer, school teacher, president of a cooperative insurance company, and local official of the [[Liberal Party of Canada|Liberal Party]].  His mother, a homemaker and a community activist, died when he was fourteen years old.<ref name=Dunn2005 /> The family farm was located on Thomson Line. Both of his parents were supporters of the [[United Farmers of Ontario]] in the 1920s.

His early years were spent at a [[one-room school]] which is still standing, on 9468 Willey Road, in Iona Station.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.duttondunwich.on.ca/sites/default/files/Dutton%20Heritage%20Register%20November%202018%20WEBSITE%20VERSION.pdf|title=DUTTON DUNWICH HERITAGE REGISTER - AS OF NOVEMBER 2018|website=Duttondunwich.on.ca|access-date=July 1, 2022|archive-date=January 21, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220121194509/https://www.duttondunwich.on.ca/sites/default/files/Dutton%20Heritage%20Register%20November%202018%20WEBSITE%20VERSION.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref> Later, he went to Dutton High School and St. Thomas High School. In 1931, Galbraith graduated with a [[Bachelor of Science in Agriculture]] from the [[Ontario Agricultural College]], which was then an associate agricultural college of the [[University of Toronto]]. He majored in animal husbandry. He was awarded a Giannini Scholarship in Agricultural Economics (receiving $60 per month)<ref name=Dunn2005 /> that allowed him to travel to Berkeley, California, where he received masters and [[Doctor of Philosophy]] degrees in [[agricultural economics]] from the [[University of California, Berkeley]]. Galbraith was taught economics by Professor George Martin Peterson, and together they wrote an economics paper titled "The Concept of Marginal Land" in 1932 that was published in the ''American Journal of Agricultural Economics''.<ref>{{cite journal|url=https://oup.silverchair-cdn.com/oup/backfile/Content_public/Journal/ajae/14/2/10.2307/1230112/2/14-2-295.pdf?Expires=1490628957&Signature=J1fFLg11KnVT1w8N5sMmUIt7GI59j~wIpDhvqpJtyKiaoXELL1-wpp2YNdCAMz-ibjj1ruVejpnZ9EIhqD35qorh9FGqKy41GmKou21Q~szz~iAE7KX6f1~aqdHh-okFzDSS5UgXKg6bUlnfSMISAtNTpdbtBolpqCEJurKiiLcLkZdyw1MfJOlYyKim8yrXNPHE3eTH435I6IJkTGvNi9ceY1jMXmZX-8kKYptmeOE9z4l~KHsHY6-MGyIi5HZgr6vECyC0-a79qSZw3rLQBz-x1SdjTj4RHUc1giLrwxHAutQ7PKOMaxxi9s1n0IXeT1HuWOSN7o6IIbtTHc54sA__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAIUCZBIA4LVPAVW3Q|title=Am. J. Agric. Econ. (1932) 14 (2): 295-310 (link last visited 23 March 2017).|journal=Journal of Farm Economics|volume=14|issue=2|page=295|doi=10.2307/1230112|jstor=1230112|year=1932|last1=Peterson|first1=G.M.|last2=Galbraith|first2=J.K.}}</ref>

After graduation in 1934, he started to work as an instructor at [[Harvard University]]. Galbraith taught intermittently at Harvard in the period 1934 to 1939.<ref name="thecrimson.com"/> From 1939 to 1940, he taught at [[Princeton University]]. In 1937, he became a citizen of the United States and was no longer a [[British subject]].{{efn|{{citation needed span|date=July 2022|text=Canada did not have its own citizenship at the time, but later the United States and Canada acknowledged that their citizens, who had taken out citizenship in the others' countries, were recognized as having also retained their original citizenship, and Galbraith died as he had been born—a Canadian, although he had previously been amply honored as a Canadian as well as an American.}}}} In the same year, he took a year-long fellowship at the [[University of Cambridge]], England, where he was influenced by [[John Maynard Keynes]]. He then traveled in Europe for several months in 1938, attending an international economic conference and developing his ideas.<ref>[[#Galbraith1981|Galbraith (1981)]] ch. 6.</ref> He served for a few months in summer 1934 in the U.S. Department of Agriculture.<ref>Galbraith, ''Name-Dropping: From F.D.R. On'' (1999) pp. 14–15.</ref>  As a Harvard teacher in 1938 he was given charge of a research project for the National Resources Planning Board.<ref>Galbraith, ''A Life in Our Times'', pp. 90, 93.</ref><ref>He wrote National Resources Planning Board, ''The economic effects of the federal public works expenditures, 1933–1938'' (1940) [https://archive.org/details/economiceffectso1940rich online]</ref>  From 1943 until 1948, he served as an editor of ''[[Fortune (magazine)|Fortune]]'' magazine. In 1949, he was appointed professor of economics at Harvard. He also taught at the [[Harvard Extension School]].<ref name=gates>{{Citation | title = The Gates Unbarred: A History of University Extension at Harvard, 1910–2009| year = 2010 | author = Shinagel, Michael | publisher = Harvard University Press | isbn = 978-0674051355|page=52}}</ref>

===World War II===
[[File:JohnKennethGalbraithOWI.jpg|thumb|right|Photograph was taken between 1940 and 1946 "I react pragmatically. Where the market works, I'm for that. Where the government is necessary, I'm for that. I'm deeply suspicious of somebody who says, 'I'm in favor of privatization,' or, 'I'm deeply in favor of public ownership.' I'm in favor of whatever works in the particular case." — C-SPAN, November 13, 1994<ref>Albalate, D. (2014). The privatisation and nationalisation of European roads: Success and failure in public-private partnerships. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, p. YIII.</ref>]]The United States went into WWII with an economy still not fully recovered from the [[Great Depression]].<ref>Rockoff, Hugh (2012) ''America's Economic Way of War: War and the U.S. Economy from the Spanish–American War to the Persian Gulf War''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. {{ISBN|0521676738}}.</ref> Because wartime production needs mandated large budget deficits and an accommodating monetary policy, inflation and a runaway wage-price spiral were seen as likely.<ref>Digests of Interpretation of the General Maximum Price Regulation. Washington, DC: [[Office of Price Administration]], 1942.</ref> As a part of a team charged with keeping inflation from damaging the war effort, Galbraith served as a deputy administrator of the [[Office of Price Administration]] (OPA) during [[United States home front during World War II|World War II]] in 1941–1943. The OPA directed the process of stabilization of prices and rents.<ref>{{Cite journal | doi = 10.2307/1884653| jstor = 1884653| title = The Tactics of Retail Price Control| journal = The Quarterly Journal of Economics| volume = 57| issue = 4| pages = 497–521| year = 1943| last1 = Miller | first1 = J.P.}}</ref>

On May 11, 1941, President Roosevelt created the Office of Price Administration and Civilian Supply (OPACS). On August 28, 1941, it became the Office of Price Administration (OPA). After the US entered the war in December 1941, OPA was tasked with rationing and price controls.  The [[Emergency Price Control Act of 1942|Emergency Price Control Act]] passed on January 30, 1942, legitimized the OPA as a separate federal agency. It merged OPA with two other agencies: Consumer Protection Division and Price Stabilization Division of the Advisory Commission to the Council of National Defense.<ref>Mansfield, Harvey C. ''et al.'' (1948) [http://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015043513608 ''A Short History of OPA''], Office of Temporary Controls, Office of Price Administration.</ref> The council was referred to as the National Defense Advisory Commission (NDAC), and was created on May 29, 1940.<ref name="Gale">Carson, Thomas, and Mary Bonk. Gale Encyclopedia of U.S. Economic History. Detroit: Gale Group, 1999. [http://www.answers.com/topic/office-of-price-administration]</ref> NDAC emphasized voluntary and advisory methods in keeping prices low. [[Leon Henderson]], the NDAC commissioner for price stabilization, became the administrator of OPACS and of OPA in 1941–1942. He oversaw a mandatory and vigorous price regulation that started in May 1942 after OPA introduced the General Maximum Price Regulation (GMPR). It was much criticized by the business community. In response, OPA mobilized the public on behalf of the new guidelines and said that it reduced the options for those who were seeking higher rents or prices. OPA had its own Enforcement Division, which documented the increase of violations: a quarter million in 1943 and more than 300,000 during the next year.<ref name="Gale" />

Historians and economists differ over the assessment of the OPA activities, which started with six people, but then grew to 15,000 staffers.<ref>[http://www.booknotes.org/Watch/60409-1/John+Kenneth+Galbraith.aspx ''Booknotes'' interview with Galbraith]  {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303215326/http://www.booknotes.org/Watch/60409-1/John%2BKenneth%2BGalbraith.aspx |date=March 3, 2016 }} on ''A Journey Through Economic Time'', November 13, 1994.</ref><ref name="Guardian Profile">{{cite web | url=https://www.theguardian.com/education/2002/apr/06/socialsciences.highereducation | title=Last of the old-style liberals | work=The Guardian Profile: John Kenneth Galbraith | date=April 5, 2002 | access-date=July 4, 2013 | author=Steele, Jonathan }}</ref>  Some of them point to the fact that price increases were relatively lower than during the [[First World War]], and that the overall economy grew faster. [[Steven Pressman (economist)|Steven Pressman]], for example, wrote that "when the controls were removed there was only a small increase in prices, thereby demonstrating that inflationary pressures were actively managed and not just kept temporarily under control."<ref>{{cite book|author=Pressman, Steven |title=Leading Contemporary Economists: Economics at the Cutting Edge|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RbUwqHAE4XQCpg|location=London|publisher=Taylor & Francis|year=2009|page=286}}</ref> Galbraith said in an interview that he considered his work at the OPA as his major life achievement, since prices were relatively stable during WWII.<ref name="Guardian Profile" /> The role of the OPA, however, as well as the whole legacy of the US government wartime economic stabilization measures from a long-term perspective, remains debated. [[Richard Parker (economist)|Richard Parker]], who earlier had written a well regarded biography of Galbraith had this to say about Galbraith's efforts during the war:

<blockquote>[H]e had first gone to work in the nation's capital in 1934 as a 25-year-old, fresh out of graduate school and just about to join the Harvard faculty as a young instructor.  He had returned to Washington in mid-1940, after Paris fell to the Germans, initially to help ready the nation for war.  Eighteen months later, after Pearl Harbor, he was then appointed to oversee the wartime economy as "price czar," charged with preventing inflation and corrupt price-gouging from devastating the economy as it swelled to produce the weapons and materiel needed to guarantee victory against fascism.  In this, he and his colleagues at the Office of Price Administration had been stunningly successful, guiding an economy that quadrupled in size in less than five years without fanning the inflation that had haunted World War I, or leaving behind an unbalanced post-war collapse of the kind that had done such grievous damage to Europe in the 1920s.<ref name=parker>[http://www.johnkennethgalbraith.com/index.php?page=articles&display=7 "Richard Parker : The Legacy of John Kenneth Galbraith"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170629020127/http://www.johnkennethgalbraith.com/index.php?page=articles&display=7 |date=June 29, 2017 }}. johnkennethgalbraith.com.</ref></blockquote>

Opposition to the OPA came from conservatives in Congress and the business community. It undercut Galbraith and he was forced out in May 1943, accused of "communistic tendencies".<ref>[[#Parker|Parker]], pp. 132–52.</ref> He was promptly hired by [[Henry Luce]], a conservative Republican and a dominant figure in American media as publisher of ''Time'' and ''Fortune'' magazines. Galbraith worked for Luce for five years and expounded Keynesianism to the American business leadership.<ref>[[#Parker|Parker]], pp. 156–71.</ref> Luce allegedly said to President Kennedy, "I taught Galbraith how to write—and have regretted it ever since."<ref name="RES Newsletter">{{cite web | url=http://www.res.org.uk/SpringboardWebApp/userfiles/res/file/obituaries/galbraith.pdf | title=J K Galbraith | publisher=Royal Economic Society | work=RES Newsletter, July 2006, no.132 | access-date=July 3, 2013 | archive-date=October 13, 2013 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131013050823/http://www.res.org.uk/SpringboardWebApp/userfiles/res/file/obituaries/galbraith.pdf | url-status=dead }}</ref> Galbraith saw his role as educating the entire nation on how the economy worked, including the role of big corporations. He was combining his writing with numerous speeches to business groups and local Democratic party meetings, as well as frequently testifying before Congress.<ref>{{cite book|author=Waligorski, Conrad |title=John Kenneth Galbraith: The Economist As Political Theorist|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=i1gJyodX2WEC&pg=PA8|year=2006|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|page=8|isbn=978-0742531499}}</ref>

During the late stages of WWII in 1945, Galbraith was invited by [[Paul Nitze]] to serve as one of the "Officers" of the [[Strategic bombing survey|Strategic Bombing Survey]], initiated by the [[Office of Strategic Services]]. It was designed to assess the results of the aerial bombardments of Nazi Germany.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/AAF/USSBS/ | title=United States Strategic Bombing Survey Reports | website=Ibiblio.org | access-date=July 3, 2013}}</ref> The survey found that German war production went up rather than down as German cities were being bombed.  Henderson (2006) wrote, 'Galbraith had to fight hard to have his report published without it being rewritten to hide the essential points.  "I defended it," he wrote, "with a maximum of arrogance and a minimum of tact."' Those findings created a controversy, with Nitze siding with others of the "Officers" managing the survey and with [[The Pentagon|Pentagon]] officials, who declared the opposite. Later, Galbraith described the willingness of public servants and institutions to bend the truth to please the Pentagon as the "Pentagonania syndrome".<ref>Carroll, James (2006). ''House of War: The Pentagon and the Disastrous Rise of American Power''. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co. {{ISBN|0618872019}}. p. 178. <!-- Galbraith (1969) How to control the military -->{{cite Q|Q114772547}}</ref>

===Postwar===
In February 1946, Galbraith took a leave of absence from his magazine work for a senior position in the State Department as director of the Office of Economic Security Policy where he was nominally in charge of economic affairs regarding Germany, Japan, Austria, and South Korea. Distrusted by senior diplomats, he was relegated to routine work, with few opportunities to make policy.<ref>[[#Galbraith1981|Galbraith (1981)]] ch. 16.</ref> Galbraith favored [[détente]] with the Soviet Union, along with Secretary of State [[James F. Byrnes]] and General [[Lucius D. Clay]], a military governor of the US Zone in Germany from 1947 to 1949,<ref name="RES Newsletter" /> but they were out of step with the [[containment]] policy then being developed by [[George F. Kennan|George Kennan]] and favored by the majority of the US major policymakers. After a disconcerting half-year, Galbraith resigned in September 1946 and went back to his magazine writing on economics issues.<ref>[[#Galbraith1981|Galbraith (1981)]] pp. 247, 255</ref><ref>[[#Parker|Parker]], pp. 203, 216.</ref> Later, he immortalized his frustration with "the ways of [[Foggy Bottom]]" in a [[satire|satirical]] novel, ''The Triumph'' (1968).<ref>Galbraith, John Kenneth. ''The Triumph: A Novel of Modern Diplomacy''. Boston, Mass: Houghton Mifflin, 1968.</ref> The postwar period also was memorable for Galbraith because of his work, along with [[Eleanor Roosevelt]] and [[Hubert Humphrey]], to establish a progressive policy organization [[Americans for Democratic Action]] (ADA) in support of the cause of economic and social justice in 1947. In 1952, Galbraith's friends [[Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.]] and [[George Ball (diplomat)|George Ball]] recruited him to work as a speechwriter for the Democratic candidate, [[Adlai Stevenson II|Adlai Stevenson]].{{sfn|Parker|2005|pp=253-54}} The involvement of several intellectuals from the ADA in the Stevenson campaign attracted controversy as the Republican Senator [[Joseph McCarthy]] accused the ADA intellectuals as being "tainted" by "well documented Red associations"; Galbraith later said one of his regrets was that McCarthy failed to condemn him as one of Stevenson's "red" advisers.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=263}}

=== Kennedy administration ===
[[File:JKGalbraith JFK.jpg|right|thumb|230px|Galbraith at left, as US ambassador to India, with President John F. Kennedy, Vice-President Lyndon B. Johnson, and Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru of India, 1961]]
During his time as an adviser to President [[John F. Kennedy]], Galbraith was appointed [[United States Ambassador to India]] from 1961 to 1963. His rapport with Kennedy was such that he regularly bypassed the State Department and sent his diplomatic cables directly to the president.<ref name="Rediff India Abroad" /> Galbraith disliked his superior, Secretary of State [[Dean Rusk]], writing to Kennedy that trying to communicate via Rusk was "like trying to fornicate through a mattress".{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=351}} In India, he became a confidant of Prime Minister [[Jawaharlal Nehru]] and extensively advised the Indian government on economic matters.

Kennedy considered India to be important not just in its own right, but also because an Indian diplomat always served as the chief commissioner of the [[International Control Commission]] (ICC). Thus, Galbraith came to be involved in American policy towards Southeast Asia from his perch as an ambassador in New Delhi.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=354}} In 1961, when Kennedy considered intervening in the civil war in Laos, Galbraith strongly advised him not to, warning him that the disastrous [[Bay of Pigs Invasion]] had been caused by Kennedy taking the advice offered by the hawkish [[Joint Chiefs of Staff]], who had assured him that the invasion could not fail and were now saying the same about the proposed intervention in Laos.{{sfn|Parker|2005|pp=355-356}} Galbraith also noted that the ICC was also responsible for Laos as well as the two Vietnams, and he had Nehru's word that the Indian diplomats on the ICC were willing to serve as honest brokers for a peace deal to make Laos neutral in the Cold War.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=356}}

In May 1961, the Indian ICC members had been able to broker a ceasefire in Laos and Kennedy decided to go for the neutralization option instead of war.{{sfn|Parker|2005|pp=356-57}} During the talks in Geneva to discuss a solution to the Lao crisis, the chief American delegate, [[W. Averell Harriman]], discovered the Chinese foreign minister, [[Chen Yi (marshal)|Chen Yi]], was willing to meet him in private.{{sfn|Langguth|2000|pp=132-33}} However, Rusk forbade Harriman to talk to Chen under any circumstances, fearful of Republican attacks against the Democrat Kennedy if the meetings should come out to the media, causing Harriman to explode in rage that during World War II, Roosevelt had allowed him to meet whoever was necessary.{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=133}} Unable to change Rusk's mind, Harriman appealed to Galbraith, who in his turn appealed to Kennedy.{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=133}} Kennedy granted permission for Harriman to meet Chen, provided that it was done under the strictest secrecy, but by that time, Chen had returned to Beijing.{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=133}} In May 1961, when Vice President Lyndon Johnson visited India, Galbraith had the duty of escorting him around various sites in India and attempting to explain some of his Texas mannerisms such as his shouts of "yee-hah!" that he made when he saw the Taj Mahal, which confused the Indians.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=359}}

From the embassy in New Delhi, Galbraith emerged as a critic of the increasing American involvement in Vietnam. In November 1961, he visited [[South Vietnam]] where he presented an unflattering picture of the regime of President [[Ngo Dinh Diem]], saying "we are now married to failure". He advised finding a new South Vietnamese leader, saying "nothing succeeds like successors".{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=157}}  In May 1962, Galbraith cabled Kennedy, stating that according to the most recent statements made by [[United States Secretary of Defense|Secretary of Defense]] [[Robert McNamara]], Diem had about 170,000 men under arms at present, while claiming that his country was in major danger from 20,000 lightly armed [[Viet Cong]] guerrillas.{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=172}} Galbraith proceeded to do a statistical comparison, under which he calculated that in proportional terms, Diem had an army that was approximately the ratio to the population that was equivalent to that of the U.S Army to the American people after the Civil War, while the Viet Cong had a ratio equivalent to that of the Sioux vs the American people, leading Galbraith to sarcastically ask why Diem needed more American support.{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=172}} He concluded his cable to Kennedy: "Incidentally, who is the man in your administration who decides what countries are strategic? I would like to have his name and address and ask him what is so important about this real estate in the Space Age".{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=172}}

In January 1963, when Polish Foreign Minister [[Adam Rapacki]] visited New Delhi, Galbraith met with him to declare to him his "despair" about Kennedy's Vietnam policies and to ask that Poland, as one of the three members of the ICC, try help find a diplomatic solution to the Vietnam War.{{sfn|Gnoinska|2005|p=6-7}} Galbraith told Rapacki that he favored an agreement to neutralize the two Vietnams similar to the neutralization agreement signed for Laos in 1962.{{sfn|Gnoinska|2005|p=6}} On February 5, 1963, [[Przemysław Ogrodziński]], the Polish ambassador in New Delhi, was ordered by his superiors in Warsaw: "As far as the Vietnam matter, we are discussing it. It was received with interest. Deliberations will continue. As for now, we suggest inviting Galbraith to lunch and sounding [him] out, without committing ourselves, in order for him to see that we are looking into this matter".{{sfn|Gnoinska|2005|p=351}}

Although Galbraith had acted on his own in approaching Rapacki, he had some support from Kennedy, who told him "to pursue the subject immediately."<ref name="McMath">{{cite news |last1=McMath |first1=Philip |title=Ken Burns, JFK and the unopened door |url=https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2017/oct/15/ken-burns-jfk-and-the-unopened-door-201/ |publisher=Arkansas Democrat-Gazette |date=October 15, 2017}}</ref> This was the origin of the "Maneli affair", named after [[Mieczysław Maneli]], the Polish Commissioner to the ICC who, together with [[Ramchundur Goburdhun]], the Indian Commissioner on the ICC, approached leaders in both North and South Vietnam with a proposal to make both Vietnams neutral in the Cold War.<ref name="McMath"/>

On April 1, 1963, Galbraith flew to Washington to discuss the peace proposal with Kennedy, where the president told him "to be prepared to seize upon any favorable moment to reduce our commitment [in Vietnam]", though it "might yet be some time away."<ref name="McMath"/> In September 1963, Maneli met with [[Ngô Đình Nhu]], the younger brother and right-hand man of President Diem, to discuss neutralization, a meeting that was leaked to the right-wing American columnist [[Joseph Alsop]].<ref name="McMath"/> At that point Kennedy lost interest in the "Maneli affair", instead deciding to back an alternative option he had been considering since August:  a coup against the Ngo brothers.<ref name="McMath"/>

While in India, he helped establish one of the first computer science departments, at the [[Indian Institute of Technology]] in [[Kanpur]], [[Uttar Pradesh]].<ref name="Rediff India Abroad">{{cite news | url=http://www.rediff.com/news/2003/jul/28spec.htm | title=India-China war 'accidental:' Galbraith | work=The Rediff Special | date=July 28, 2003 | agency=Rediff India Abroad | access-date=July 4, 2013 | author=Athale, Anil }}</ref> (Even after leaving office, Galbraith remained a friend and supporter of India.)
Because of his recommendation, [[First Lady of the United States]] [[Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis|Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy]] undertook her 1962 [[Jacqueline Kennedy's 1962 goodwill tour of India and Pakistan|diplomatic missions in India and Pakistan]].
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=== Johnson administration ===
After leaving the American embassy in India, Galbraith continued to advise Johnson, now president, against escalating American involvement in Vietnam. In 1965, he advised Johnson that he should "instruct officials and spokesmen to stop saying the future of mankind, the United States, and human liberty is being decided in Vietnam. It isn't; this merely builds up a difficult problem out of all proportion. It is also terrible politics".{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=383}} During the 1966 Buddhist crisis in South Vietnam, Galbraith wrote Johnson a letter on April 3 saying he now had "an opportunity only the God-fearing deserve and only the extremely lucky get", saying that if the government of Air Marshal [[Nguyễn Cao Kỳ]] should fall, Johnson should use the occasion to pull all Americans out of Vietnam.{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=427}}

On June 16, 1966, Galbraith offered to write Johnson a speech that would set out an orderly withdrawal of American forces over the next year.{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=427}} Galbraith advised Johnson the beginning of the [[Cultural Revolution]] in China represented an opportunity for a diplomatic settlement of the Vietnam war, predicting that [[Mao Zedong]] would lose interest in Vietnam now that he had launched his Cultural Revolution.{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=428}} The National Security Adviser, [[W.W. Rostow]], wrote the reply to Galbraith that was signed by Johnson, curtly declaring: "I have never doubted your talent for political craftsmanship, and I am sure you could devise a script that would appear to justify our taking an unjustifiable course in South Vietnam".{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=427}} On June 28, 1966, Galbraith made his final attempt to change Johnson's mind, warning that the Vietnam War would ruin his presidency and that he should stop taking the advice of Rostow.{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=427}} Galbraith stated that Johnson had the potential to be one of the greatest presidents if only he find a way out of Vietnam, and concluded: "The people who want to invest more and more in this war have nothing to lose. They will end up working for a foundation".{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=427}}

In 1966, when he was no longer ambassador, he told the United States Senate that one of the main causes of the 1965 Kashmir war was American military aid to Pakistan.<ref>{{cite book|author=Sundararajan, Saroja |title=Kashmir Crisis Unholy Anglo Pak Nexus|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8xntfrAZkbsC&pg=PA299|year=2010|publisher=Gyan Publishing House|pages=299–|isbn=978-8178358086}}</ref>

[[File:American Ambassador to India John Kenneth Galbraith and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy at the U. S. Chancery, New Delhi.jpg|left|thumb|250px|Galbraith and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy at the US Chancery, New Delhi]]

In early 1968, Galbraith endorsed Senator [[Eugene McCarthy]], who ran against Johnson on an anti-war platform.{{sfn|Langguth|2000|p=480}} During the New Hampshire Democratic primary, Galbraith toured the Granite State, giving pro-McCarthy speeches in churches, union halls, campuses and house parties.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=456}} As McCarthy had the reputation of being strange and frivolous, Galbraith's support and campaigning for him was important, as McCarthy needed the endorsement of mainstream figures to give him credibility.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=454}} When the New Hampshire Democratic primary was held on March 12, 1968, Johnson defeated McCarthy by only about 300 votes, a humiliation for an incumbent president with a well funded campaign running against a senator widely considered to be too eccentric to be president, and who had only a fraction of the campaign money that Johnson had.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=456}}{{sfn|Karnow|1983|p=558}} Though Johnson won the primary, the very narrow margin of his victory was widely considered to be a defeat. On the night of the primary, Galbraith celebrated the result at McCarthy campaign headquarters as if it were an outright victory.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=456}} The day after the New Hampshire primary, Galbraith was widely cheered by his students when he entered his lecture hall at Harvard.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=456}}

The results of the New Hampshire primary showed that Johnson was vulnerable. On March 16, 1968, Senator [[Robert F. Kennedy]] announced he was entering the presidential race. Kennedy asked Galbraith to withdraw his endorsement of McCarthy and to endorse him instead, a request that Galbraith refused.{{sfn|Parker|2005|pp=456-57}} The historian [[Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.]], who campaigned with Galbraith in New Hampshire for McCarthy, switched his support to Kennedy, on the grounds that Kennedy was a far more electable candidate than the eccentric McCarthy, a man most people found to be too silly to be president.{{sfn|Parker|2005|pp=456-57}} Schlesinger strongly urged Galbraith to support Kennedy, but Galbraith chose to continue to campaign for McCarthy, partly because McCarthy's liberalism was closer to his own politics, and partly out of a personal revulsion for Kennedy, who had only opportunistically entered the presidential race when it became clear that Johnson was not invincible.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=457}} Galbraith had been friends with John Kennedy, but his relations with Robert were more difficult, as Galbraith found Robert too rigid, utterly convinced that he was always right.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=457}} Galbraith later said that with Robert Kennedy "You were either for the cause or against it, with the Kennedys or a leper".{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=457}}

After Kennedy was assassinated, McCarthy became so depressed that he almost dropped out of the election, and Galbraith visited several times to urge him to continue, through Galbraith later admitted "...I don't believe Eugene McCarthy's heart was ever wholly in the battle".{{sfn|Parker|2005|pp=469-70}} At the chaotic and violent Democratic National Convention in August 1968 in Chicago, Galbraith attended as the floor manager for the McCarthy campaign.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=469}} Amid what was later called a "police riot", as the Chicago police fought in the streets with anti-Vietnam war protesters, Galbraith held an impromptu speech outside the Hilton Hotel before a group of demonstrators, urging them to reject violence and to have patience, while assuring them that the American system was capable of reform and change.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=470}} Galbraith pointed to the armed Illinois National Guardsmen standing in the background and said that they, unlike the Chicago police, were not the enemy, as he maintained that most of the young men who joined the Illinois National Guard had only done so to avoid being drafted to fight in Vietnam.{{sfn|Parker|2005|pp=470-71}} After finishing his speech, a National Guard sergeant approached Galbraith, who froze up in fear as he believed he was about to be arrested. Instead the sergeant wanted to shake hands, saying: "Thank you, sir. That was the first nice thing anyone has said about us all week".{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=471}}

At the convention, supporters of Johnson challenged Galbraith's right to serve as a delegate, and sought to expel him from the building.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=471}} Galbraith quarreled with Johnson supporters on the convention floor as he sought to add a peace plank to the Democratic platform, which Johnson saw as an insult to himself, and ordered the delegates to reject.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=471}} The Mayor of Chicago, Richard Daley, a Johnson supporter, had imposed such stringent security conditions that it was impossible to walk across the convention hall without jostling somebody else, which added to the tension of the convention as pro-war and anti-war Democrats fiercely argued about the platform, all of which was captured live on national television.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=471}} Adding to the tension were televisions on the convention floor that showed what was happening outside, as the Chicago police attacked and beat anti-war demonstrators.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=471}} On Daley's orders, the Chicago police searched Galbraith's room at the Hilton hotel, alleging that he was hiding anti-war protesters.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=471}} None were found.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=471}} After Vice President Hubert Humphrey won the Democratic nomination, Galbraith reluctantly endorsed Humphrey as preferable to the Republican candidate, Richard Nixon.{{sfn|Parker|2005|p=472}}

===Later life and recognition===
In autumn 1972, Galbraith was an adviser and assistant to Nixon's rival candidate, Senator [[George McGovern]], in the election campaign for the American presidency. During this time (September 1972) he travelled to China in his role as president of the [[American Economic Association]] (AEA) at the invitation of [[Mao Zedong]]'s [[communism|communist]] government, together with fellow economists [[Wassily Leontief]] and [[James Tobin]]. In 1973, Galbraith published an account of his experiences in ''A China Passage'', writing that there was "no serious doubt that China is devising a highly effective economic system," "[d]issidents are brought firmly into line in China, but, one suspects, with great politeness," and "Greater Shanghai ... has a better medical service than New York,". He considered it not implausible that Chinese industrial and agricultural output was expanding annually at a rate of 10 to 11%.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hayashi |first1=Stuart K. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LjW_BgAAQBAJ&pg=PA253 |title=Hunting Down Social Darwinism: Will This Canard Go Extinct? |date=2015 |publisher=Lexington Books |isbn=978-0739186718 |page=253 |language=en}}</ref>

In 1972 he served as president of the [[American Economic Association]].<ref>{{cite web|title=Past AEA Officers |url=http://www.vanderbilt.edu/AEA/officerspast.htm |publisher=American Economic Association |access-date=October 10, 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080920103459/http://www.vanderbilt.edu/AEA/officerspast.htm |archive-date=September 20, 2008 }}</ref> The ''Journal of Post Keynesian Economics'' benefited from Galbraith's support and he served as the chairman of its board from its beginning.<ref name=Dunn2005/>

During the shooting of ''[[The World at War]]'', a British television documentary series (1973–74), Galbraith described his experiences in the Roosevelt war administration. Among other things, he spoke about the initial confusion during the first meeting of the major departmental leaders about [[Ceiba pentandra|kapok]] and its use.{{relevance inline|date=August 2021}} Galbraith also talked about rationing and especially about trickery during fuel allocation.

In December 1977, he met the Palauan senator [[Roman Tmetuchl]] and eventually became an unpaid adviser to the Palau Political Status Commission. He advocated for minimal financial requirement and infrastructure projects. In 1979 he addressed Palau's legislature and participated in a seminar for the delegates to the Palau Constitutional Convention. He became the first person to earn [[honorary citizenship]] of Palau.<ref name="Shuster 2002">{{cite book |title=Roman Tmetuchl: A Palauan Visionary |publisher=Roman Tmetuchl Family Trust |isbn=978-9829064011 |last=Shuster |first=Donald R. |year=2002 |pages=209–13}}</ref>

In 1984, he visited the USSR, writing that the Soviet economy had made "great material progress" as, "in contrast to Western industrial economy," the USSR "makes full use of its manpower."<ref>{{cite book|last1=Gvosdev|first1=Nikolas K.|title=The Strange Death of Soviet Communism: A Postscript|date=2017|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1351473200|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Rj4rDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA133|language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Jones|first1=Milo|last2=Silberzahn|first2=Philippe|title=Constructing Cassandra: Reframing Intelligence Failure at the CIA, 1947–2001|date=2013|publisher=Stanford University Press|isbn=978-0804787154|page=102|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZVYTAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA102|language=en}}</ref>

In 1985, the [[American Humanist Association]] named him the Humanist of the Year. The [[Association for Asian Studies]] (AAS) conferred its 1987 Award for Distinguished Contributions to Asian Studies<!--?on Galbraith?-->.<ref>Association for Asian Studies (AAS), [http://www.aasianst.org/publications/distinguished.htm 1987 Award for Distinguished Contributions to Asian Studies] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080517022119/http://www.aasianst.org/publications/distinguished.htm |date=May 17, 2008 }}; retrieved May 31, 2011</ref>
{{external media| float = right| video1 = [https://www.c-span.org/video/?192803-1/memorial-service-john-kenneth-galbraith Memorial service for Galbraith at Memorial Church in Harvard Yard, Cambridge, May 31, 2006], [[C-SPAN]]}}
In 1997 he was made an Officer of the [[Order of Canada]].<ref name=order>{{cite web|url=http://www.gg.ca/honours/search-recherche/honours-desc.asp?lang=e&TypeID=orc&id=3766|archive-url=https://archive.today/20070517165119/http://www.gg.ca/honours/search-recherche/honours-desc.asp?lang=e&TypeID=orc&id=3766|url-status=dead|title=Order of Canada|date=May 17, 2007|archive-date=May 17, 2007}}</ref> In 2000 he was awarded the US [[Presidential Medal of Freedom]]. He also was awarded an honorary doctorate from [[Memorial University of Newfoundland]] at the fall convocation of 1999,<ref>{{Cite news|title=John Kenneth Galbraith in St. John's |url=https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/john-kenneth-galbraith-in-st-john-s-1.184858 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090702225207/http://www.cbc.ca/news/story/1999/10/21/nf_galbraith991021.html |url-status=live |archive-date=July 2, 2009 |publisher=[[Canadian Broadcasting Corporation]] |access-date=October 12, 2008 | date=October 21, 1999}}</ref> another contribution to the impressive collection of approximately fifty academic honorary degrees bestowed upon Galbraith. In 2000, he was awarded the [[Leontief Prize]] for his outstanding contribution to economic theory by the [[Global Development and Environment Institute]]. The library in his hometown of [[Dutton/Dunwich, Ontario|Dutton, Ontario]] was renamed the ''John Kenneth Galbraith Reference Library'' in honor of his attachment to the library and his contributions to the new building.

On April 29, 2006, Galbraith died in [[Cambridge, Massachusetts]], of natural causes at the age of 97, after a two-week stay in a hospital.  He is interred at [[Indian Hill Cemetery]] in [[Middletown, Connecticut]].

===Family===
On September 17, 1937, Galbraith married [[Catherine Galbraith|Catherine Merriam Atwater]], whom he met while she was a [[Radcliffe College|Radcliffe]] graduate student. Their marriage lasted for 68 years. The Galbraiths resided in [[Cambridge, Massachusetts]], and had a summer home in [[Townshend, Vermont]]. They had four sons: J. Alan Galbraith was a partner in the Washington, DC, law firm [[Williams & Connolly]] (now retired); Douglas Galbraith died in childhood of leukemia; [[Peter W. Galbraith]] has been an American diplomat who served as Ambassador to [[Croatia]] and is a commentator on American foreign policy, particularly in the [[Balkans]] and the [[Middle East]]; [[James K. Galbraith]] is a progressive economist at the [[University of Texas at Austin]] [[Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs]]. The Galbraiths also had ten grandchildren.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FB0F15FE3A5B0C738FDDAD0894DE404482 | title=John Kenneth Galbraith, 97, Dies; Economist Held a Mirror to Society | work=The New York Times | date=April 30, 2006 | access-date=July 3, 2013 |author1=Noble, Holcomb B.|author2=Martin, Douglas}}</ref>

A memorial plaque stands adjoining a stone [[inukshuk]] overlooking the Galbraith family farm on the Thompson (Hogg) Line just east of Willey Road, just north of the one room school he attended. The family home—a large white farm house—still stands, as do many of the original farm buildings.

==Writings==
Even before becoming a president of the American Economic Association, Galbraith was considered as an [[iconoclasm|iconoclast]] by many economists. This is partly because he rejected the technical analysis and mathematical modelling of [[neoclassical economics]] as being divorced from reality. Following [[Thorstein Veblen]], he believed that economic activity could not be distilled into inviolable laws, but rather was a complex product of the cultural and political milieu in which it occurs. In particular, he posited that important factors, such as the separation between corporate ownership and management, [[oligopoly]], and the influence of government and military spending had been largely neglected by most economists because they are not amenable to axiomatic descriptions. In this sense, he worked as much in [[political economy]] as in [[classical economics]].

His work included several best selling books throughout the fifties and sixties. His major contribution to the field of economics is the so-called ''American capitalism'' trilogy: The ''Affluent Society'' (1958), ''The New Industrial State'' (1967), and ''Economics and the Public Purpose'' (1973). Written in a clear and concise style, they were comprehensible to lay readers, not just economists.

After his retirement from Harvard as the Paul M. Warburg Professor of Economics, Emeritus,<ref name="Harvard Gazette" /> he remained in the public spotlight by continuing to write 21 new books, as well as completing a script in 1977 for a major series on economics for [[PBS]] and [[BBC]] television—''[[The Age of Uncertainty]]'', broadcast in 38 countries.<ref name="Harvard Gazette" />

In addition to his books, he wrote hundreds of essays and a number of novels. Among his novels, ''[[A Tenured Professor]]'' achieved particular critical acclaim. Galbraith wrote book reviews, e.g., of ''[[The Report from Iron Mountain]] on the Possibility and Desirability of Peace'', a 1967 political satire, under the pen name of ''Herschel McLandress'', a name of a fictional Scottish mentor featured in the ''Tenured Professor''.<ref>Collins, Phillip Darrell and Collins, Paul David (2004) ''The Ascendancy of the Scientific Dictatorship: An Examination of Epistemic Autocracy from the 19th to the 21st Century''. New York: IUniverse. {{ISBN|0595311644}}. p. 125.</ref><ref>{{cite encyclopedia |title=Galbraith, John Kenneth |encyclopedia=encyclopedia.com |year=2009}}</ref> He also used the pseudonym, Mark Épernay, when he published ''The McLandress Dimension'' in 1963.<ref>Galbraith, John Kenneth (1963). ''The McLandress Dimension''. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.</ref>

===Economics books===
Galbraith was an important figure in 20th-century [[institutional economics]], and provided an exemplary ''institutionalist'' perspective on [[economic power]].<ref>Stilwell, Frank J.B. (2002) ''Political Economy: The Contest of Economic Ideas''. South Melbourne, Vic: Oxford University Press. {{ISBN|0195575016}}</ref> Among his numerous writings, Galbraith cherished ''The New Industrial State'' and ''The Affluent Society'' as his two best.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Adams|given=Philip|title=Interview on Radio National, Late Night Live|publisher=[[Australian Broadcasting Corporation]]|year=1999|url=http://www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/lnl/stories/s64155.htm|access-date=January 17, 2006|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060214063133/http://www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/lnl/stories/s64155.htm|archive-date=February 14, 2006|url-status=dead}}. Accessed January 17, 2006.</ref> As for the later works, economist and Galbraith friend Mike Sharpe visited him in 2004, on which occasion Galbraith gave Sharpe a copy of what would be Galbraith's last book, ''[[The Economics of Innocent Fraud]]''. Galbraith confided in Sharpe that "this is my best book", an assertion Galbraith delivered "a little mischievously."<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Sharpe|given=Mike|title=John Kenneth Galbraith, 1908–2006|journal=[[Challenge: The Magazine of Economic Affairs]]|volume= 49 |issue=4|page=7|year=2006 |doi= 10.2753/cha0577-5132490401 |s2cid=153529393}}</ref>

After the beginning of the [[Great Recession in the United States|Great Recession of 2008]], Galbraith's ''[[The Great Crash, 1929]]'' (1955) and other books containing warnings about the dangers of an unrestrained speculative mood without proper government oversight found an attentive readership again. In 2010, the [[Library of America]] published a new edition of Galbraith's major works, edited by his son, [[James K. Galbraith]]: ''The Affluent Society & Other Writings, 1952–1967'': ''American Capitalism'', ''The Great Crash, 1929'', ''The Affluent Society'', and ''The New Industrial State''.<ref>Galbraith, John Kenneth (2010). ''The Affluent Society & Other Writings, 1952–1967''. New York: [[The Library of America]]. {{ISBN|978-1598530773}}</ref> On this occasion, [[Bill Moyers]] interviewed James K. Galbraith about his father, his works, and his legacy.<ref>{{cite AV media | url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxDmw7rCfeQ | archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211113/JxDmw7rCfeQ| archive-date=November 13, 2021 | url-status=live| title=The Unconventional Wisdom of John Kenneth Galbraith: A Conversation with Bill Moyers and James K. Galbraith. Part 1–4. | publisher=The Library of America | date=February 22, 2011 | people=Moyers,  Bill and Galbraith, James K. | medium=Video | location=The Grolier Club, New York City. November 17, 2010.}}{{cbignore}}</ref>

====American economy====
In ''[[American Capitalism|American Capitalism: The Concept of Countervailing Power]]'', published in 1952, Galbraith concluded that the American economy was managed by a triumvirate of big business, big labor, and an activist government. Galbraith defined the actions of the industry lobby groups and unions as ''countervailing power''. He contrasted this arrangement with the period prior to the previous Depression, when big business had relatively free rein over the economy.

His 1955 bestseller ''[[The Great Crash, 1929]]'' describes the Wall Street meltdown of stock prices and how markets progressively become decoupled from reality in a speculative boom. The book is also a platform for Galbraith's humor and keen insights into human behavior when wealth is threatened. It has never been out of print.

In ''[[The Affluent Society]]'' (1958), which became a bestseller, Galbraith outlined his view that to become successful, post–World War II America should make large investments in items such as highways and education, using funds from general taxation.

Galbraith also critiqued the assumption that continually increasing material production is a sign of economic and societal health. Because of this Galbraith is sometimes considered one of the first [[post-materialism|post-materialists]]. In this book, he popularized the old phrase "[[conventional wisdom]]".<ref>(Galbraith, 1958 The Affluent Society: Chapter 2 "The Concept of Conventional Wisdom")</ref> Galbraith worked on the book while in Switzerland and had originally titled it ''Why The Poor Are Poor'', but changed it to ''The Affluent Society'' at his wife's suggestion.<ref name="Rediff India Abroad"/> ''The Affluent Society'' contributed (likely to a significant degree, given that Galbraith had the ear of President Kennedy<ref name="NY Times">Noble, Holcomb B. and Martin, Douglas (April 30, 2006) [https://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/30/obituaries/30galbraith.html John Kenneth Galbraith, 97, Dies; Economist, Diplomat and Writer]. ''The New York Times''.</ref>) to the "[[war on poverty]]", the government spending policy introduced by the administrations of Kennedy and Johnson.

====New industrial state====
In 1966, Galbraith was invited by the BBC to present the Reith Lectures,<ref name="BBC Reith Lectures">{{cite web | url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00729d9 | title=The Reith Lectures | publisher=BBC Radio 4 | access-date=July 3, 2013}}</ref> a series of radio broadcasts, which he titled ''The New Industrial State''.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00h3y23 | title=The Reith Lectures, J K Galbraith: The New Industrial State (1966) | publisher=BBC Radio 4 | access-date=July 3, 2013}}</ref> Across six broadcasts, he explored the economics of production and the effect large corporations could have over the state.

In the print edition of ''[[The New Industrial State]]'' (1967), Galbraith expanded his analysis of the role of power in economic life, arguing that very few industries in the United States fit the model of [[perfect competition]]. A central concept of the book is the revised sequence. The 'conventional wisdom' in economic thought portrays economic life as a set of competitive markets governed, ultimately, by the decisions of sovereign consumers. In this original sequence, the control of the production process flows from consumers of commodities to the organizations that produce those commodities. In the revised sequence, this flow is reversed and businesses exercise control over consumers by advertising and related salesmanship activities.

The revised sequence concept applies only to the industrial system—that is, the manufacturing core of the economy in which each industry contains only a handful of very powerful corporations. It does not apply to the market system in the Galbraithian dual economy. In the market system, composed of the vast majority of business organizations, price competition remains the dominant form of social control. In the industrial system, however, composed of the 1,000 or so large corporations, competitive price theory obscures the relation to the price system of these large and powerful corporations. In Galbraith's view, the principal function of market relations in this industrial system is, not to constrain the power of the corporate behemoths, but to serve as an instrument for the implementation of their power. Moreover, the power of these corporations extends into commercial culture and politics, allowing them to exercise considerable influence upon popular social attitudes and value judgments. That this power is exercised in the shortsighted interest of expanding commodity production and the status of the few is both inconsistent with democracy and a barrier to achieving the quality of life that the new industrial state with its affluence could provide.

''The New Industrial State'' not only provided Galbraith with another best-selling book, it also extended once again, the currency of ''institutionalist'' economic thought. The book also filled a very pressing need in the late 1960s. The conventional theory of monopoly power in economic life maintains that the monopolist will attempt to restrict supply in order to maintain price above its competitive level. The social cost of this monopoly power is a decrease in both allocative efficiency and the equity of income distribution. This conventional economic analysis of the role of monopoly power did not adequately address popular concern about the large corporation in the late 1960s. The growing concern focused on the role of the corporation in politics, the damage done to the natural environment by an unmitigated commitment to economic growth, and the perversion of advertising and other pecuniary aspects of culture. ''The New Industrial State'' gave a plausible explanation of the power structure involved in generating these problems and found a very receptive audience among the rising American counterculture and political activists.

A third related work was ''[[Economics and the Public Purpose]]'' (1973), in which he expanded on these themes by discussing, among other issues, the subservient role of women in the unrewarded management of ever-greater consumption, and the role of the [[technostructure]] in the large firm in influencing perceptions of sound economic policy aims.

====Financial bubbles====
In ''A Short History of Financial Euphoria'' (1990), he traces speculative bubbles through several centuries, and argues that they are inherent in the free market system because of "mass psychology" and the "vested interest in error that accompanies speculative euphoria." Also, financial memory is "notoriously short": what currently seems to be a "new financial instrument" is inevitably nothing of the sort. Galbraith cautions: "The world of finance hails the invention of the wheel over and over again, often in a slightly more unstable version." Crucial to his analysis is the assertion that the common factor in boom-and-bust is the creation of debt to finance speculation, which "becomes dangerously out of scale in relation to the underlying means of payment."

===Legacy===
Galbraith's main ideas focused around the influence of the [[market power]] of large corporations.<ref name=Dunn2005/> He believed that this market power weakened the widely accepted principle of consumer sovereignty, allowing corporations to be price makers, rather than price takers,<ref name=Galbraith1970>{{Cite journal|last=Galbraith|first=John K|year=1970|title=Economics as a System of Belief|journal=American Economic Review|volume=60|issue=2|pages=469–78|url=http://cas.umkc.edu/econ/AFEE/EconomicsAsaSystemofBelief.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090326030041/http://cas.umkc.edu/econ/AFEE/EconomicsAsaSystemofBelief.pdf|url-status=dead|archive-date=March 26, 2009}}</ref> allowing corporations with the strongest market power to increase the production of their goods beyond an efficient amount. He further believed that market power played a major role in inflation.<ref name=Dunn2005/> He argued that corporations and trade unions could only increase prices to the extent that their market power allowed. He argued that in situations of excessive market power, price controls effectively controlled inflation, but cautioned against using them in markets that were basically efficient such as agricultural goods and housing.<ref name=Money>Galbraith JK. (1977). ''Money: Where It Came, Whence It Went''. Houghton Mifflin.</ref> He noted that price controls were much easier to enforce in industries with relatively few buyers and sellers.<ref name=Money/>{{Rp|244}} Galbraith's view of market power was not entirely negative; he also noted that the power of US firms played a part in the success of the US economy.

In ''[[The Affluent Society]]'' Galbraith asserts that classical economic theory was true for the eras before the present, which were times of "poverty"; now, however, we have moved from an age of poverty to an age of "affluence", and for such an age, a completely new economic theory is needed.

Galbraith's main argument is that as society becomes relatively more affluent, private business must create consumer demand through [[advertising]], and while this generates artificial affluence through the production of commercial goods and services, the public sector becomes neglected. He points out that while many Americans were able to purchase luxury items, their parks were polluted and their children attended poorly maintained schools. He argues that markets alone will under-provide (or fail to provide at all) for many public goods, whereas private goods are typically "over-provided" due to the process of advertising creating an artificial demand above the individual's basic needs. This emphasis on the power of advertising and consequent over-consumption may have anticipated the drop in savings rates in the US and elsewhere in the developing world.<ref name=Dunn2005/>

Galbraith proposed curbing the consumption of certain products through greater use of [[pigovian tax]]es and [[land value tax]]es,<ref>{{cite web|last=Bourke|first=Joe|title=Opinion: Land Value Tax – an old idea with lots of modern supporters|url=http://www.libdemvoice.org/opinion-land-value-tax-an-old-idea-with-lots-of-modern-supporters-28459.html|access-date=September 24, 2013}}</ref>  arguing that this could be more efficient than other forms of taxation, such as labor taxes. Galbraith's major proposal was a program he called "investment in men"—a large-scale, publicly funded education program aimed at empowering ordinary citizens.

An International Symposium to honor John Kenneth Galbraith, sponsored by the l'Université du Littoral Côte d'Opale, Dunkerque and the Institut de Gestion Sociale, Paris, France, was held in September 2004 in Paris.<ref>Laperche, Blandine and [[Dimitri Uzunidis]]. ''John Kenneth Galbraith and the Future of Economics''. Papers from the International Symposium Honoring John Kenneth Galbraith Held in Paris in September 2004. Basingstoke, England: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.</ref>

A special issue ''Commemorating John Kenneth Galbraith's Centenary'' of the ''Review of Political Economy'' was dedicated in 2008 to Galbraith's contribution to economics.<ref>{{cite news | url=http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/crpe20/20/4 | title=Special Issue of the Review of Political Economy: Commemorating John Kenneth Galbraith's Centenary | newspaper=Taylor & Francis | volume=20 |issue=4 |year=2008 | access-date=July 2, 2013}}</ref>

Three days before his death, Galbraith urged his son, economist [[James K. Galbraith]], to "write a short book on corporate predation"; the younger Galbraith completed ''[[The Predator State]]'' in 2008.

===Reception===
Galbraith's work in general, and ''The Affluent Society'' in particular, have drawn sharp criticism from [[laissez-faire]] supporters since the time of their publications. Nobel Prize-winning economist [[Milton Friedman]] in "Friedman on Galbraith, and on curing [[the British disease]]" views Galbraith as a 20th-century version of the early-19th-century [[Tories (British political party)|Tory]] radical of Great Britain. He argues that Galbraith believes in the superiority of aristocracy and in its paternalistic authority, that consumers should not be allowed choice, and that all should be determined by those with "higher minds", commenting: "Many reformers—Galbraith is not alone in this—have as their basic objection to a free market that it frustrates them in achieving their reforms, because it enables people to have what they want, not what the reformers want. Hence every reformer has a strong tendency to be averse to a free market."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Friedman |first=Milton |title=Friedman on Galbraith and on Curing the British Disease |publisher=The Fraser Institute |year=1977 |isbn=0889750157}}</ref>

Nobel Prize-winning economist [[Robert Solow]], in a review of ''[[The New Industrial State]]'', points at Galbraith's lack of [[empiricism]] and selectiveness in his use of evidence. He points out that "It may be unjust and pointless to consider the degree of literal truth of each of the assertions that make up this argument. One would hardly discuss Gulliver's Travels by debating whether there really are any little people, or criticize the Grande Jatte because objects aren't made up of tiny dots. Nevertheless, it may help to judge the truth of Galbraith's."<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nationalaffairs.com/public_interest/detail/the-new-industrial-state-son-of-affluence|title=The New Industrial State: Son of Affluence|access-date=September 26, 2017}}</ref>

[[Richard Parker (economist)|Richard Parker]], in his biography, ''John Kenneth Galbraith: His Life, His Economics, His Politics'', characterizes Galbraith as a more complex thinker. Galbraith's primary purpose in ''Capitalism: The Concept of Countervailing Power'' (1952) was, ironically, to show that [[big business]] was now necessary to the American economy to maintain the technological progress that drives [[economic growth]]. Galbraith knew that the "countervailing power", which included [[government regulation]] and collective bargaining, was necessary to balanced and efficient markets. In ''The New Industrial State'' (1967), Galbraith argued that the dominant American corporations had created a [[technostructure]] that closely controlled both [[consumer demand]] and [[Market (economics)|market]] growth through [[advertising]] and [[marketing]]. While Galbraith defended government intervention, Parker notes that he also believed that government and big business worked together to maintain stability.<ref>Madrick, J. (May 26, 2005) [http://www.johnkennethgalbraith.com/index.php?page=press&display=40 "A Mind of His Own: Review of ''John Kenneth Galbraith: His Life, His Economics, His Politics.''"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160309031525/http://johnkennethgalbraith.com/index.php?display=40&page=press |date=March 9, 2016 }} ''The New York Review of Books''.</ref>

[[Paul Krugman]] downplayed Galbraith's stature as an academic economist in 1994. In ''[[Peddling Prosperity]]'', he places Galbraith as one among many "policy entrepreneurs"—either economists, or think tank writers, left and right—who write solely for the public, as opposed to those who write for other academics, and who are, therefore, liable to make unwarranted diagnoses and offer over-simplistic answers to complex economic problems. Krugman asserts that Galbraith was never taken seriously by fellow academics, who instead viewed him as more of a "media personality". For example, Krugman believes that Galbraith's work, ''The New Industrial State'', is not considered to be "real economic theory", and that ''Economics in Perspective'' is "remarkably ill-informed".<ref>Krugman, Paul (1994) ''[[Peddling Prosperity]]''. Scranton, Pennsylvania: W.W. Norton. {{ISBN|978-0393312928}}. pp. 10–15.</ref>

[[Thomas Sowell]] in his 1995 book ''[[The Vision of the Anointed]]'', criticized Galbraith's claims in ''The Affluent Society'' and ''The New Industrial State'' that large corporations are invincible to competition, by citing [[Toyota]] and [[Honda]]'s takeover of the [[United States]]' automobile market at the expense of [[General Motors]], the decline of [[Life (magazine)|''Life'']] magazine, and overall, the displacement of almost half of the firms in 1980's [[Fortune 500]] in the 1990 edition. Sowell also criticized Galbraith's assertion that successful corporate management was immune to corporate shake-ups. Sowell believed Galbraith's contemptuousness towards the idea of a lone entrepreneur starting up a new, powerful company to not have stood up to the test of time; Sowell used [[Steve Jobs]] and [[Bill Gates]] as counterexamples.<ref>Sowell, Thomas (1995) ''[[The Vision of the Anointed]]''. Basic Books. {{ISBN|978-0465089956}}. pp. 64-65.</ref>

===Memoirs===
{{external media| float = right| video1 = [https://www.c-span.org/video/?170027-1/john-kenneth-galbraith Discussion with Galbraith and biographer Richard Parker, May 9, 2002], [[C-SPAN]]| video2 = [https://www.c-span.org/video/?186530-1/john-kenneth-galbraith Discussion with Parker on ''John Kenneth Galbraith: His Life, His Politics, His Economics'', April 17, 2005], [[C-SPAN]]}}
The first edition of ''The Scotch'' was published in the UK under two alternative titles: as ''Made to Last'' and ''The Non-potable Scotch: A Memoir of the Clansmen in Canada''.<ref>Galbraith, John Kenneth (1964). ''The Scotch''. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.</ref> It was illustrated by Samuel H. Bryant. Galbraith's account of his boyhood environment in [[Elgin County, Ontario|Elgin County]] in southern [[Ontario]] was added in 1963. He considered it his finest piece of writing.<ref>[[#Parker|Parker]], p. 435.</ref>

Galbraith memoir, ''A Life in Our Times'' was published in 1981.<ref>[[#Galbraith1981|Galbraith (1981)]]</ref> It contains discussion of his thoughts, his life, and his times. In 2004, the publication of an authorized biography, ''John Kenneth Galbraith: His Life, His Politics, His Economics''<ref name=parker/> by a friend and fellow progressive economist [[Richard Parker (economist)|Richard Parker]] renewed interest in Galbraith's life journey and legacy.

==Honors==
John Kenneth Galbraith was one of the few people to receive both the World War II [[Medal of Freedom (1945)|Medal of Freedom]] and the [[Presidential Medal of Freedom]]; respectively in 1946 from President Truman and in 2000 from President [[Bill Clinton]].<ref>[https://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4959302.stm Liberal thinker JK Galbraith dies], an April 2006 [[BBC]] article</ref> He was elected to the [[American Academy of Arts and Sciences]] in 1952<ref>{{Cite web |title=John Kenneth Galbraith |url=https://www.amacad.org/person/john-kenneth-galbraith |access-date=June 15, 2022 |website=American Academy of Arts & Sciences |language=en}}</ref> and the [[American Philosophical Society]] in 1980.<ref>{{Cite web |title=APS Member History |url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=John+Kenneth+Galbraith&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced |access-date=June 15, 2022 |website=search.amphilsoc.org}}</ref> He was a recipient of [[Lomonosov Gold Medal]] in 1993 for his contributions to science. He also was appointed to the [[Order of Canada]] in 1997<ref name=order/> and, in 2001, awarded the [[Padma Vibhushan]], India's second highest civilian award, for his contributions to strengthening ties between India and the United States.<ref>[http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2001/06.14/05-galbraith.html Galbraith receives prestigious award] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304063724/http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/2001/06.14/05-galbraith.html |date=March 4, 2016 }}, a June 2001 [[Harvard]] News Gazette article</ref> The government of France made him a [[Legion of Honour|Commandeur de la Légion d'honneur]].
* [[Lomonosov Gold Medal]] in 1993
* [[Order of Canada]] (Officer) in 1997
* [[Padma Vibhushan]] (India) in 2001

In 2010, he became the first economist to have his works included in the [[Library of America]] series.<ref>John Kenneth Galbraith, The Affluent Society and Other Writings 1952–1967 (ed. James K. Galbraith, New York: The Library of America, 2010) {{ISBN|978-1598530773}}</ref>

Minor Planet (4089) Galbraith is named in his honour.

===Honorary degrees===
John Kenneth Galbraith received fifty [[Honorary Degree]]s from institutions around the world:

;Honorary Degrees
{| class="wikitable" style="width:100%;"
! style="width:20%;"| Location
! style="width:20%;"| Date
! style="width:40%;"| School
! style="width:20%;"| Degree
|-
| {{Flagu|New York}} || '''1958''' || [[Bard College]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bard.edu/catalogue/index.php?aid=278&sid=59&pid=|title=Bard College Catalogue|first=Bard|last=College|website=Bard.edu}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Ontario}} || '''1961''' || [[University of Toronto]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>[http://www.governingcouncil.utoronto.ca/Assets/Governing+Council+Digital+Assets/Boards+and+Committees/Committee+for+Honorary+Degrees/degreerecipients1850tillnow.pdf University of Toronto Honorary Degree Recipients, 1850–2014. Sorted Alphabetically by Name of Recipient (June, 2014)]. governingcouncil.utoronto.ca</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|India}} || '''1961''' || [[Annamalai University]] || [[D. Litt.]]<ref>Galbraith, John Kenneth. Ambassador's Journal. p. 211. New American Library.  New York, NY. 1970.</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Massachusetts}} || '''October 6, 1963''' || [[Brandeis University]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.brandeis.edu/trustees/hdr/recipients.html|title=Honorary Degree Recipients - Board of Trustees - Brandeis University|website=Brandeis.edu}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Ontario}} || '''May 1965''' || [[University of Guelph]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>{{cite web|url=https://uoguelph.civicweb.net/filepro/documents/2273?preview=2272|title=University of Guelph - Document Center|website=uoguelph.civicweb.net}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Saskatchewan}} || '''May 20, 1965''' || [[University of Saskatchewan]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>[http://library.usask.ca/archives/campus-history/honorary-degrees.php?id=163&view=detail&keyword=&campuses= "Honorary Degrees"]. December 23, 2014.</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Michigan}} || '''1966''' || [[University of Michigan]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>{{cite web |url=https://president.umich.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2018/01/Honorary-Degrees-1836-Present.pdf |title=Honorary Degrees|website=president.umich.edu}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Massachusetts}} || '''1967''' || [[Boston College]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>[http://www.bc.edu/content/dam/files/publications/factbook/pdf/98_99/fb99-degree-conf-hondgr.pdf Honorary Degrees Awarded by Boston College, 1952–1998] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171226231439/http://www.bc.edu/content/dam/files/publications/factbook/pdf/98_99/fb99-degree-conf-hondgr.pdf |date=December 26, 2017 }}. bc.edu</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|New York}} || '''1967''' || [[Hobart and William Smith Colleges]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.hws.edu/alumni/remarkable/honoraries.asp|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304195259/http://www.hws.edu/alumni/remarkable/honoraries.asp|url-status=dead|title="Hobart and William Smith Colleges :: Honorary Degree Recipients"|archive-date=March 4, 2016|access-date=July 1, 2022}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Ontario}} || '''1967''' || [[Queen's University at Kingston|Queen's University]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.queensu.ca/registrar/sites/webpublish.queensu.ca.uregwww/files/files/HDrecipients.pdf |title=Honorary Degrees|website=Queensu.ca}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Ontario}} || '''May 31, 1968''' || [[University of Western Ontario]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>University of Western Ontario Honorary Degrees Awarded, 1881 – present [http://www.uwo.ca/univsec/senate/honorary_degrees_by_surname.pdf PDF] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120212182410/http://www.uwo.ca/univsec/senate/honorary_degrees_by_surname.pdf |date=February 12, 2012 }}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Massachusetts}} || '''1968''' || [[Tufts University]] || [[Doctor of Humane Letters]] (DHL)<ref>[http://trustees.tufts.edu/data/degrees/ "Honorary Degrees"]. trustees.tufts.edu</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Michigan}} || '''1968''' || [[Albion College]] || [[Doctor of Letters]] (D.Litt.)<ref name="National Archives">{{cite web|url=http://www.jfklibrary.org/~/media/assets/Archives/Documents/Personal%20Papers/fa_Galbraith_John_Kenneth.pdf |title=The Personal Papers of John Kenneth Galbraith (1908–2006): Biographical Note |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration: John F. Kennedy Library |access-date=July 3, 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140106040131/http://www.jfklibrary.org/~/media/assets/Archives/Documents/Personal%20Papers/fa_Galbraith_John_Kenneth.pdf |archive-date=January 6, 2014 }}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Illinois}} || '''1970''' || [[Knox College (Illinois)|Knox College]] ||   <ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20110617074529/http://www.knox.edu/about-knox/we-are-knox/our-history/honorary-degrees/honorary-degrees-1900-1999.html Honorary Degrees]. Knox College. knox.edu</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.knox.edu/about-knox/our-history/honorary-degrees/honorary-degrees-1900-1999|title=Honorary Degrees: 1900–1999 - Knox College Honorary Degrees - Knox College|website=Knox.edu}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Michigan}} || '''Fall 1971''' || [[Michigan State University]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20110706121157/http://commencement.msu.edu/files_msucommencement/imce/list_speakers_baccdeg.pdf Michigan State University: Commencement speakers]. commencement.msu.edu</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://vprgs.msu.edu/honorary-degree-recipients-chrono|title=Honorary degree recipients, 1885–2015 - Vice President for Research and Graduate Studies|website=Vprgs.msu.edu}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://vprgs.msu.edu/msu-honorary-degree-recipients-alphabetical-list#G|title=MSU Honorary Degree Recipients: Alphabetical List - Vice President for Research and Graduate Studies|website=Vprgs.msu.edu}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Ontario}} || '''Spring 1976''' || [[York University]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>{{cite web|url=http://secretariat.info.yorku.ca/senate/sub-committee-on-honorary-degrees-and-ceremonials/honorary-degree-recipients/#G|title=Honorary Degree Recipients - University Secretariat|website=Secretariat.info.yorku.ca}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Minnesota}} || '''1977''' || [[Carleton College]] ||  <ref>{{cite web|url=https://apps.carleton.edu/events/commencement/degrees/recipients/|title=Honorary Degree Recipients - Honorary Degrees - Carleton College|website=Apps.carleton.edu |date=December 17, 2010 }}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|New Jersey}} || '''1979''' || [[Rutgers University]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>[http://ruweb.rutgers.edu/governance/secretary/degrees-year.shtml "Past Honorary Degree Recipients"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120214172602/http://ruweb.rutgers.edu/governance/secretary/degrees-year.shtml |date=February 14, 2012 }}.</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Iowa}} || '''1983''' || [[Grinnell College]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20100528160903/http://www.grinnell.edu/car/confops/commencement/sp_awards/hd Grinnell College: Honorary degrees]. grinnell.edu</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.grinnell.edu/about/offices-services/confops/commencement/honorary-degrees|title=Past Honorary Degrees - Grinnell College|website=Grinnell.edu|access-date=February 1, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170223214944/https://www.grinnell.edu/about/offices-services/confops/commencement/honorary-degrees|archive-date=February 23, 2017|url-status=dead}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Ontario}} || '''November 1984''' || [[McMaster University]] || [[Doctor of Letters]] (D.Litt.)<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.mcmaster.ca/univsec/reports_lists/S_HD_Recipients.pdf |title=Honorary Degree Recipients (Chronological)|website=Mcmaster.ca}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Massachusetts}} || '''June 1988''' || [[Harvard University]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)
|-
| {{Flagu|Massachusetts}} || '''1989''' || [[Smith College]] || [[Doctor of Laws]] (LL.D.)<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.smith.edu/about-smith/smith-history/honorary-degrees|title=Honorary Degrees - Smith College|website=Smith.edu}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Poland}} || '''1992''' || [[Warsaw School of Economics]] || Doctorate<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20120905140409/http://www.sgh.waw.pl/ogolnouczelniane/100lat/Varia/doktorzy_hc/ Doktorzy honoris causa (rok nadania tytułu)]. Warsaw School of Economics</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|United Kingdom}} || '''June 28, 1999''' || [[London School of Economics]] || [[Doctor of Science]] (D.Sc.)<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.lse.ac.uk/newsAndMedia/news/archives/1999/press-release_galbraith.aspx|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20130422042850/http://www2.lse.ac.uk/newsAndMedia/news/archives/1999/press-release_galbraith.aspx|url-status=dead|title="Professor Galbraith to receive honorary degree"|archive-date=April 22, 2013|access-date=July 1, 2022}}</ref>
|-
| {{Flagu|Newfoundland and Labrador}} || '''Fall 1999''' || [[Memorial University of Newfoundland]] || [[Doctor of Letters]] (D.Litt.)<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20130514191112/http://www.mun.ca/president/99-00report/honor/honorary_galbraith.html John Kenneth Galbraith]. Memorial University of Newfoundland</ref>
|}

==Works==
{{external media| float = right | video1 = [https://www.c-span.org/video/?33779-1/the-culture-contentment Presentation by Galbraith on ''The Culture of Contentment'', October 27, 1992], [[C-SPAN]]| video2 = [https://www.c-span.org/video/?60409-1/a-journey-economic-time ''Booknotes'' interview with Galbraith on ''A Journey Through Economic Time'', November 13, 1994], [[C-SPAN]]| video3 = [https://www.c-span.org/video/?71544-1/the-good-society Presentation by Galbriath on ''The Good Society'', May 1, 1996], [[C-SPAN]]| video4 = [https://www.c-span.org/video/?106542-1/letters-kennedy Presentation by Galbraith on ''Letters to Kennedy'', May 26, 1998], [[C-SPAN]]| video5 = [https://www.c-span.org/video/?124629-1/name-dropping-fdr-on Presentation by Galbraith on ''Name-Dropping: From FDR On'', June 8, 1999], [[C-SPAN]]}}
{{colbegin|colwidth=32em}}
* ''Modern Competition and Business Policy'' (with [[Henry S. Dennison]]), 1938
* National Resources Planning Board, ''The economic effects of the federal public works expenditures, 1933–1938'' (1940) [https://archive.org/details/economiceffectso1940rich online]
* ''A Theory of Price Control'', 1952
* ''[[American Capitalism: The Concept of Countervailing Power]]'', 1952
* ''[[The Great Crash, 1929]]'', 1954
* ''Economics and the Art of Controversy'', 1955
* ''[[The Affluent Society]]'', 1958
* ''Journey to Poland and Yugoslavia'', 1958
* ''Perspectives on Conservation'', 1958
* ''The Liberal Hour'', 1960
* ''Economic Development in Perspective'', 1962
* ''The Scotch'', 1963
* ''The McLandress Dimension'' (under the pseudonym Mark Épernay), 1963
* ''Economic Development'', 1964
* ''The New Industrial Estate'' (BBC Reith Lectures),<ref name="BBC Reith Lectures" /> 1966
* ''[[The New Industrial State]]'', 1967 [https://archive.org/details/newindustrialsta0000galb online]
* ''Beginner's Guide to American Studies'', 1967
* ''How to get out of Vietnam'', 1967
* ''The Triumph (novel)'', 1968
* ''Ambassador's Journal'', 1969
* ''How to control the military'', 1969
* ''Indian Painting'' (with Mohinder Singh Randhawa), 1969
* ''Who needs democrats, and what it takes to be needed'', 1970
* ''[https://digital.library.lse.ac.uk/Documents/Detail/the-american-left-and-some-british-comparisons-1971/110035 The American Left and Some British Comparisons]'', 1971
* ''Economics, Peace and Laughter'', 1972
* ''Power and the Useful Economist'', 1973
* ''[[Economics and the Public Purpose]]'', 1973
* ''A China Passage'', 1973
* ''John Kenneth Galbraith introduces India'' (Editor), 1974
* ''Money: Whence It Came, Where It Went'', 1975
* ''Socialism in rich countries and poor'', 1975
* ''The Economic effects of the Federal public works expenditures, 1933-38'' (with G. Johnson), 1975
* ''[[The Age of Uncertainty]]'' (PBS and BBC 13 part television series), 1977
* ''The Galbraith Reader'', 1977
* ''Almost Everyone's Guide to Economics'' (with Nicole Salinger), 1978
* ''Annals of an Abiding Liberal'', 1979
* ''[[The Nature of Mass Poverty]]'', 1979
* ''A Life in Our Times'', 1981 [https://archive.org/details/lifeinourtimesme0000galb online]
* ''The Voice of the Poor'', 1983
* ''[[The Anatomy of Power]]'', 1983
* ''Essays from the Poor to the Rich'' (with Paul McCracken), 1983
* ''Reaganomics: Meaning, Means and Ends'', 1983
* ''A View from the Stands'', 1986
* ''Economics in Perspective: A Critical History'', 1987
** ''A History of Economics: The Past as the Present'', 1987 [https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.120773 online]
* ''Capitalism, Communism and Coexistence'' (with [[Stanislav Menshikov]]), 1988
* ''Unconventional Wisdom: Essays on Economics in Honour of John Kenneth Galbraith'' (Editor), 1989 [https://archive.org/details/unconventionalwi00bowl online]
* ''[[A Tenured Professor]]'', 1990
* ''[[The Culture of Contentment]]'', 1992  [https://archive.org/details/cultureofcontent0000galb online]
* ''Recollections of the New Deal: When People Mattered'' (Editor), 1992
* ''A Journey Through Economic Time'', 1994
* ''The World Economy Since the Wars: A Personal View'', 1994 [https://archive.org/details/worldeconomysinc0000galb online]
* ''A Short History of Financial Euphoria'', 1994
* ''The Good Society: the humane agenda'', 1996
* ''Letters to Kennedy'', 1998
* ''The socially concerned today'', 1998
* ''Name-Dropping: From F.D.R. On'', 1999
* ''The Essential Galbraith'', 2001
* ''[[The Economics of Innocent Fraud]]'', 2004
{{colend}}

==See also==
{{Portal|Biography|Economics|Liberalism|Politics}}
* [[List of liberal theorists]]
* [[Modern liberalism in the United States]]
* ''[[The Best and the Brightest]]''
* [[The bezzle]] (Term)

==Notes==
{{notelist}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

===Works cited===
* {{cite book|ref=Galbraith1981|author=Galbraith, John Kenneth|title=A Life in Our Times: Memoirs|place=Boston|publisher= Houghton Mifflin|year=1981|isbn=978-0345303233}}
* {{cite journal |last1=Gnoinska |first1=Margaret |title=Poland and Vietnam, 1963: New Evidence on Secret Communist Diplomacy and the "Maneli Affair" |journal=Cold War International History Project Working Paper |date=March 2005 |volume=45 |pages=2–83}}
* {{cite book|last=Karnow |first=Stanley |author-link=Stanley Karnow |title=Vietnam: A History|location=New York |publisher=Viking |date=1983 |isbn=0670746045}}
* {{cite book|last=Langguth |first=A.J. |author-link=A. J. Langguth |title=Our Vietnam: The War 1954–1975|location=New York|publisher=Simon & Schuster|date=2000|isbn=0743212444}}
* {{cite book|last=Parker |first=Richard|title=John Kenneth Galbraith: His Life, His Politics, His Economics|url=https://archive.org/details/johnkennethgalbr00park|url-access=registration|place=New York|publisher= Farrar, Straus, and Giroux|year= 2005|isbn=978-0226646770}}

====Obituaries====
* {{cite news| title = John Kenneth Galbraith, writer, economist, dies | date = April 30, 2006 | newspaper = [[The Boston Globe]] | url = https://www.boston.com/news/globe/obituaries/articles/2006/04/30/john_kenneth_galbraith_writer_economist_dies/ | first1=Mark | last1=Feeney
}}
* {{cite news| title = John Kenneth Galbraith, 97, Dies; Economist Held a Mirror to Society | date = April 30, 2006 | newspaper = [[The New York Times]] | url = https://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/30/obituaries/30galbraith.html | first1=Holcomb B. | last1=Noble | first2=Douglas | last2=Martin | access-date=May 6, 2010
}}
* {{cite news| title = John Kenneth Galbraith; Popularized Modern Economics | date = May 1, 2006 | newspaper = [[The Washington Post]] | url = https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/30/AR2006043000422.html | first=Bart | last=Barnes | access-date=May 6, 2010}}
* {{cite news| title = Famed economist John Kenneth Galbraith dies at 97 | date = April 30, 2006 | newspaper = [[USA Today]] | url = http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-04-30-galbraith_x.htm | access-date=July 11, 2013}}
* {{cite web | url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2006/4/30/john-kenneth-galbraith-longtime-economics-professor/ |title= John Kenneth Galbraith, Longtime Economics Professor, Dies at 97 | work=Harvard Crimson|date=April 30, 2006| access-date= July 3, 2013}}
* {{cite web | title = John Kenneth Galbraith, economist, professor, and author: Harvard icon dies at 97 | date = May 4, 2006 | website = [[Harvard University Gazette]] | url = http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2006/05.04/30-galbraith.html | first = Ken | last = Gewertz | access-date = July 11, 2013 | url-status = dead | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20110208210648/http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2006/05.04/30-galbraith.html | archive-date = February 8, 2011 | df = mdy-all }}
* <!-- David R. Henderson (2006) John Kenneth Galbraith: A Criticism and an Appreciation-->{{cite Q|Q114796509}}
* {{cite news| title = Professor J. K. Galbraith: Author of 'The Affluent Society' and one of the 'action intellectuals' of mid-20th-century America | date = May 1, 2006 | newspaper = [[The Independent]] | url = https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/professor-j-k-galbraith-476341.html | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20101011120449/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/professor-j-k-galbraith-476341.html | url-status = dead | archive-date = October 11, 2010 | first=Godfrey | last=Hodgson | access-date=July 11, 2013}}
* {{cite news| title = Obituary: John Kenneth Galbraith  | date = April 30, 2006 | work = BBC News | url =https://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/330355.stm  | access-date=July 11, 2013}}

==Further reading==
* {{cite encyclopedia |title=John Kenneth Galbraith (1908–2006) |url=http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/bios/Galbraith.html |encyclopedia=[[The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics]] |edition=2nd |series=[[Library of Economics and Liberty]] |publisher=[[Liberty Fund]] |year=2008|isbn=978-0865976665 |editor-first=David R.|editor-last=Henderson |editor-link=David R. Henderson |pages=535–36}}
* {{Cite book| publisher = New American Library| last = Hession| first = Charles H| title = John Kenneth Galbraith & his critics| location = New York| date = 1972|lccn=78176428}}
* {{Cite book| publisher = Routledge| isbn = 978-0415212922| editor-last= Keaney| editor-first=Michael |title = Economist with a public purpose: essays in honour of John Kenneth Galbraith| location = London; New York| series = Routledge frontiers of political economy| date = 2001}}
* {{Cite book| publisher = Palgrave Macmillan| isbn = 978-1403996169| editor1-last= Laperche|editor1-first=Blandine |editor2=Uzunidis |editor2-first=Dimitri | title = John Kenneth Galbraith and the future of economics| location = Basingstoke [England]; New York| date = 2005}} (Papers from the International Symposium Honoring John Kenneth Galbraith Held in Paris in September 2004)
* {{Cite book| publisher = New York University Press| isbn = 978-0814773802| last = Reisman| first = David A.| title = Galbraith and market capitalism| location = New York| date = 1980| url-access = registration| url = https://archive.org/details/unset0000unse_v5z0}}
* {{Cite book| publisher = Free Press| isbn = 978-0029297803| last = Sobel| first = Robert| title = The worldly economists| location = New York| date = 1980}}
* {{Cite book| edition = 1st| publisher = Doubleday| last = Stone| first = Irving| title = There was light: Autobiography of a university: Berkeley, 1868–1968| location = Garden City, N.Y| date = 1970|lccn=77078738}}
* Thacker, Innes (1980), ''Ideological Control and the Depoliticisation of Language'', in Bold, Christine (ed.), ''[[Cencrastus]]'' No. 2, Spring 1980, pp.&nbsp;30–33, {{issn|0264-0856}}
* {{Cite book| publisher = Rowman & Littlefield| isbn = 978-0742531482| last = Waligorski| first = Conrad| title = John Kenneth Galbraith: the economist as political theorist| location = Lanham, Md| series = 20th century political thinkers| date = 2006| url-access = registration| url = https://archive.org/details/johnkennethgalbr0000wali}}

===Primary sources===
* {{Cite book| publisher = Houghton Mifflin| isbn = 978-0618119639| last1 = Galbraith| first1 = John Kenneth| editor-last1 = Williams| editor-first1 = Andrea D.| title = The essential Galbraith| location = Boston| date = 2001| url-access = registration| url = https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780618119639}}
* {{Cite book| publisher = Cambridge University Press| isbn = 978-1107019881 | last1 = Galbraith| first1 = John Kenneth| editor-last1 = Holt| editor-first1 = Richard P.F.| title = The selected letters of John Kenneth Galbraith| location = New York, NY| date = 2017}}
* {{Cite book| publisher = University Press of Mississippi| isbn = 978-1578066100| last1 = Galbraith| first1 = John Kenneth| editor-last1 = Stanfield| editor-first1 = J. Ron| editor-last2 = Stanfield| editor-first2 = Jacqueline Bloom| title = Interviews with John Kenneth Galbraith| location = Jackson| series = Conversations with public intellectuals series| date = 2004}}

==External links==
{{Commons category}}
{{Wikiquote}}
* [http://purl.lib.ua.edu/82835 Speech by John Kenneth Galbraith on March 22, 1968, discussing the impact of Vietnam on American life.] Audio recording from [http://purl.lib.ua.edu/18388 The University of Alabama's Emphasis Symposium on Contemporary Issues]
* {{Internet Archive author |sname= John Kenneth Galbraith}}
* {{C-SPAN|1877}}
* {{IMDb name|id=0301764|name=John Kenneth Galbraith}}

{{John Kenneth Galbraith|state=expanded}}
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