Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Notes on Contributors
- Chapter One The Economic Turn in Enlightenment Europe
- Chapter Two The Physiocratic Movement: A Revision
- Chapter Three The Political Economy of Colonization: From Composite Monarchy to Nation
- Chapter Four Against the Chinese Model: The Debate on Cultural Facts and Physiocratic Epistemology
- Chapter Five “Le superflu, chose très nécessaire”: Physiocracy and Its Discontents in the Eighteenth-Century Luxury Debate
- Chapter Six François Véron de Forbonnais and the Invention of Antiphysiocracy
- Chapter Seven Between Mercantilism and Physiocracy: Forbonnais's ‘Est modus in Rebus’ Vision
- Chapter Eight Physiocrat Arithmetic versus Ratios: The Analytical Economics of Jean-Joseph-Louis Graslin
- Chapter Nine Galiani: Grain and Governance
- Chapter Ten “Live and Die Proprietors and Free”: Morellet Dismantles the Dialogues and Defends the Radical Liberal Break
- Chapter Eleven “Is the Feeling of Humanity not More Sacred than The Right of Property?”: Diderot's Antiphysiocracy in His Apology of Abbé Galiani
- Chapter Twelve De facto Policies and Intellectual Agendas of an Eighteenth-Century Milanese Agricultural Academy: Physiocratic Resonances in the Società patriotica
- Chapter Thirteen Sensationism, Modern Natural Law and the “Science of Commerce” at the Heart of the Controversy between Mably and the Physiocrats
- Chapter Fourteen ‘One Must Make War on the Lunatics’: The Physiocrats’ Attacks on Linguet, the Iconoclast (1767–1775)
- Chapter Fifteen The Grain Question as the Social Question: Necker's Antiphysiocracy
- Chapter Sixteen Physiocracy in Sweden: A Note on the Problem of Inventing Tradition
- Chapter Seventeen Spain and the Economic Work of Jacques Accarias de Serionne
- Chapter Eighteen Captured by the Commercial Paradigm: Physiocracy Going Dutch
- Chapter Nineteen Cameralism, Physiocracy and Antiphysiocracy in the Germanies
- Chapter Twenty No Way Back to Quesnay: Say's Opposition to Physiocracy
- Chapter Twenty-One “A Sublimely Stupid Idea”: Physiocracy in Italy from the Enlightenment to Fascism
- Chapter Twenty-Two Epilogue: Political Economy and the Social
- Index
Chapter Six - François Véron de Forbonnais and the Invention of Antiphysiocracy
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 February 2019
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Notes on Contributors
- Chapter One The Economic Turn in Enlightenment Europe
- Chapter Two The Physiocratic Movement: A Revision
- Chapter Three The Political Economy of Colonization: From Composite Monarchy to Nation
- Chapter Four Against the Chinese Model: The Debate on Cultural Facts and Physiocratic Epistemology
- Chapter Five “Le superflu, chose très nécessaire”: Physiocracy and Its Discontents in the Eighteenth-Century Luxury Debate
- Chapter Six François Véron de Forbonnais and the Invention of Antiphysiocracy
- Chapter Seven Between Mercantilism and Physiocracy: Forbonnais's ‘Est modus in Rebus’ Vision
- Chapter Eight Physiocrat Arithmetic versus Ratios: The Analytical Economics of Jean-Joseph-Louis Graslin
- Chapter Nine Galiani: Grain and Governance
- Chapter Ten “Live and Die Proprietors and Free”: Morellet Dismantles the Dialogues and Defends the Radical Liberal Break
- Chapter Eleven “Is the Feeling of Humanity not More Sacred than The Right of Property?”: Diderot's Antiphysiocracy in His Apology of Abbé Galiani
- Chapter Twelve De facto Policies and Intellectual Agendas of an Eighteenth-Century Milanese Agricultural Academy: Physiocratic Resonances in the Società patriotica
- Chapter Thirteen Sensationism, Modern Natural Law and the “Science of Commerce” at the Heart of the Controversy between Mably and the Physiocrats
- Chapter Fourteen ‘One Must Make War on the Lunatics’: The Physiocrats’ Attacks on Linguet, the Iconoclast (1767–1775)
- Chapter Fifteen The Grain Question as the Social Question: Necker's Antiphysiocracy
- Chapter Sixteen Physiocracy in Sweden: A Note on the Problem of Inventing Tradition
- Chapter Seventeen Spain and the Economic Work of Jacques Accarias de Serionne
- Chapter Eighteen Captured by the Commercial Paradigm: Physiocracy Going Dutch
- Chapter Nineteen Cameralism, Physiocracy and Antiphysiocracy in the Germanies
- Chapter Twenty No Way Back to Quesnay: Say's Opposition to Physiocracy
- Chapter Twenty-One “A Sublimely Stupid Idea”: Physiocracy in Italy from the Enlightenment to Fascism
- Chapter Twenty-Two Epilogue: Political Economy and the Social
- Index
Summary
The physiocrats considered that François Quesnay had created a ‘new science’, political economy. They set themselves the task of celebrating this event by writing its history. It is to this end that, in 1768, Pierre Samuel Du Pont wrote De l'origine et des progrès et d'une science nouvelle. In the first pages of his essay, Du Pont attributed the foundation of the science of political economy to ‘three equally worthy friends of the inventor of the Tableau Économique: de Gournay, M. le Marquis de Mirabeau and M. le Mercier de la Riviere’. The latter two, Victor Riqueti de Mirabeau (1715–1789) and Paul-Pierre Lemercier de la Rivière (1719–1801), were the doctor's principal collaborators, but Jacques Vincent de Gournay died early, in June 1759, before physiocracy as a concept had emerged. As intendant of commerce, Gournay (1712–1759) was at the centre of a circle of writers and administrators in France in the 1750s. These men, all closely associated with commerce, were charged with translating and disseminating what they called the ‘science of commerce’. Gournay's circle shared some key elements with the physiocrats. For example, both groups considered competition to be the principal driving force for the creation and circulation of wealth. They were also both very critical of the guilds and favoured freedom in the grain trade. However, either from a theoretical or a political point of view, Gournay's circle was less homogeneous than the physiocratic movement. The science of commerce cannot be summarized as a body of doctrines because it was really the product of group discussions. In addition, most of the authors in Gournay's circle did not see ‘freedom’ and ‘property’ as being governed by the immutable laws of a transcendent ‘natural order’. In contrast to the ahistorical truths of the physiocratic order, which local and regional history and circumstances had to yield to, the science of commerce was characterized by an ongoing focus on realities, contingencies and local practices. This epistemological stance was the source of future debates between the followers of the two. For example, Gournay was aware of the need to reinforce the French monarchy's naval capacity, and he therefore defended the instigation of a Navigation Act and the colonial Exclusif.
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- Information
- The Economic TurnRecasting Political Economy in Enlightenment Europe, pp. 139 - 168Publisher: Anthem PressPrint publication year: 2019