The Search for New International Arrangements to Deal with the Agricultural Problems of Industrialized Countries

Abstract

To most observers agriculture comes the closest of any industry in modern society to meeting the conditions of competition. But, in almost every industrial country in the world there has developed a series of governmental programmes for agriculture which depart widely from the free market. This intervention is too widespread in countries where the agricultural population is a distinct minority to regard it as merely the exercise of rural political power. Instead, agricultural programmes must be regarded as a search for new institutions that will be more satisfactory than the unregulated market for the production and exchange of farm products.

The paper has benefited from suggestions of my colleague, L. W. Witt.