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'''Daniel Thorner''' (1915–1974) was an American-born [[economist]] known for his work on [[agricultural economics]] and Indian economic history.<ref name=obit>{{cite journal |last=Rosen |first=George |year=1975 |title=Obituary: Daniel Thorner (1915–1974) |journal=[[Journal of Asian Studies]] |publisher=Association for Asian Studies |volume=34 |issue=3 |page=777 |doi=10.1017/S0021911800145097 }}</ref><ref name=Easterlin>Easterlin, RA. 2004 ''The Reluctant Economist: Perspectives on Economics, Economic History and Demography'' Cambridge University Press. pp 284</ref> He is known for the application of historical and contemporary economic analysis on policy and influenced agricultural policy in India in the 1950s through his association with the [[Planning Commission (India)|Planning Commission]].<ref name=Das>Das, Gurucharan. 2000 ''India Unbound: The Social and Economic Revolution from Independence to the Global Information Age'' Anchor Books. pp. 432 {{ISBN|0-375-41164-X}}</ref><ref name="Manmohan Singh speech">Opening Address by Dr. [[Manmohan Singh]], Prime Minister of India to the [[London School of Economics|LSE]] Asia forum on 7th December 2006 [https://web.archive.org/web/20070609230250/http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/LSEAsiaForum/pdf/ManmohanSingh_OpeningAddress.pdf PDF] </ref> Along with [[Dharmananda Damodar Kosambi|D. D. Kosambi]] and [[Ram Sharan Sharma|R. S. Sharma]], he brought peasants into the study of Indian history for the first time.<ref>{{cite book
| first = Irfan
| last = Habib
| author-link = Irfan Habib
| title = Essays in Indian History
| publisher = [[Tulika]]
| year = 2007
|orig-year=1995
| isbn = 978-81-85229-00-3
| page = 381 (at p 109)
}}</ref>

==Early life==
He started his graduate studies at [[Columbia University]] in the 1930s,<ref name=obit/> and served in the [[Office of Strategic Services]]<ref name="thesis book">Thorner, D. 1977 ''Investment in Empire: British Railway and Steam Shipping Enterprise in India'' Ayer Publishing. pp 197 {{ISBN|0-405-09723-9}}</ref> before moving to [[India]] at the end of [[World War II]]. He completed his thesis on the conditions of the [[United Kingdom|British]] railway and steam ship enterprise in India in 1950, later published as a book.<ref>{{OCLC|926381528}}</ref><ref name="thesis book" /> He subsequently joined the [[University of Pennsylvania]] South Asia Regional Studies Program to teach Indian economic history.<ref name=obit /> He married [[Alice Thorner]], who was a collaborator and co-author of many of his works on India.

==Return to India==
During the 1950s, under Senator [[Joseph McCarthy]], there was a ''witchhunt'' for [[leftist]] economists, and Thorner would not divulge the names of his leftist friends. Thus he lost his job and a government-funded fellowship for a project in India. He borrowed money from his parents and left for [[Bombay]] in 1952 along with his wife<ref name=obit /><ref name=Das /> He travelled extensively in Indian villages and continued to work on agricultural economics.

==Academic work==
His stay in India resulted in three books on Indian agriculture. The first one, ''The Agrarian Prospect in India'' <ref>{{cite book|author=Daniel Thorner|title=The Agrarian prospect in India: five lectures on land reform delivered in 1955 at the Delhi School of Economics|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QPhfAAAAIAAJ|year=1956|publisher=University Press|isbn=9780598611925}}</ref> published in 1956, was based on his direct observations and interactions with villagers in several parts of India. His two subsequent books were published after he left India and were ''Agricultural cooperatives in India'',<ref>{{cite book|author=Daniel Thorner|title=Agricultural Cooperatives in India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iWowAAAAMAAJ|year=1964|publisher=Asia Publishing House}}</ref> a collection of papers on agriculture and economic history and ''Land and Labour in India''.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Daniel Thorner|author2=Alice Thorner|title=Land and labour in India|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gLY6AAAAIAAJ|year=1962|publisher=Asia Pub. House}}</ref> Both were analytical works, examining the impact of policy on Indian farmers and boldly questioned existing statistics, reports and data, where they were poor or unreliable.<ref name=obit />
In Bombay, he built a large circle of friends and admirers and contributed to the [[Economic and Political Weekly]]. He also lectured at the [[Delhi School of Economics]]. His interactions with [[Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis|PC Mahalanobis]] resulted in his contributions to the [[Planning Commission (India)|Planning Commission]] to refine the tabulations of the [[Census of India|1961 census]]. The previous tabulations for the [[Census of India|1881 and 1911 Indian census]] developed by [[Colin Clark (economist)|Colin Clark]] showed a significant decline in the share of Indian workforce in various industrial sectors implying drastic [[deindustrialization]]. Thorner reexamined the census data and convincingly argued that the tabulations used by Clark were misleading.<ref name=census>Clingingsmith, D.L. & Williamson, J.G. 2005. ''India's De-Industrialization Under British Rule:New Ideas, New Evidence'' Harvard Institute of Economic Research Discussion Paper No. 2039 Available at [http://ssrn.com/abstract=558264 SSRN]</ref> He concluded from the data that de-industrialization in India was very modest in the twentieth century, and any de-industrialization had occurred in the late nineteenth century, contrary to prevailing belief.

==Later life==
Due to desire to return to a university and partially due to economic reasons, he left India in 1962 after spending ten years, to take up an academic position at [[School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences]].<ref name="later life">Thorner, A., Patel, S., Bagchi, J., & Raj, K. 2001 ''Thinking social science in India: Essays in honour of Alice Thorner.'' Sage Publications. pp 23 {{ISBN|0-761-99600-1}}</ref> He edited the works of Harold H. Mann, an economist and [[Alexander Chayanov]]. He was instrumental in introducing Chayanov's work to the English-speaking scholars.<ref name=obit /> He continued to visit [[South Asia]] often and helped with the escape from persecution of some intellectuals from [[Dhaka]] during the [[Bangladesh Liberation War]]<ref name=obit /> After a brief period of illness, he died in 1974.

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
*{{cite web|title=Daniel Thorner|url=https://www.jstor.org/action/doBasicSearch?Query=au%3A%22Daniel+Thorner%22|publisher=[[JSTOR]]}}

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[[Category:1915 births]]
[[Category:1974 deaths]]
[[Category:Columbia University alumni]]
[[Category:Development economists]]
[[Category:20th-century American economists]]

Daniel Thorner - Revision history

>Citation bot at 05:39, 22 April 2021