Chronic. If the German and Italian economists have been much interested in the role of their predecessors during the “black years”, their French colleagues have remained indium on the subject. Facts and economic policies, under the Petain Marshal, have been studied, but not the economists themselves: their writings, their research, their career …
Hence the interest of the work of two young researchers, Nicolas Brisset and Raphaël Feck (Law Research Group, Economy, Management, Gredeg, University of Côte-d’Azur), published in 2021 in History of Political Economy (n o 53-4, Duke University Press), the history review of economic thought (n o 11, classic garnier) and politix (n O 133, from Superior Boeck) and presented on April 7 at the Circle of Economic Epistemology from Paris-i University.
In the story of the French economists, beyond the “founding fathers” of the nineteenth century, their discipline really does not take its academic and intellectual growth as from the 1950s, under the ‘Aegis of the prestigious names of Gérard Debrew and Maurice Allais (respectively Nobel Prize 1983 and 1988), Edmond Malinvaud (College de France, INSEE) and François Perroux (Chair Analysis of Economic and Social Facts at the College of France from 1955 to 1974). The two researchers observe, however, that the “intellectual program” of institutionalization of the economy as a dominant human science and as a source of expertise, for the conduct of public policies, already knows its premises under Vichy.
Only one “science of man”
Pre-War, economists debate ways to overcome law faculties, of which their teaching is only one branch. This goes through the creation of institutes and reflection circles, often funded by the private (Rockefeller Foundation). Also, when Vichy created in November 1941 the Foundation for the Study of Human Problems, led by Alexis Carrel, Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1912 and the theorist of Eugénism, many economists see the opportunity to play a role in this project to merge, in one “science of man”, psychology, sociology, biology, demography, economy, etc.
In his breast, the Economic Theory Exchange Center (CETE) organizes seminars, reflects foreign authors – essentially Anglo-Saxons, including Keynes, Hayek, Hicks, Kaldor – and publishes the very first manuals of economy for students. Participate in young economists (Mauritius Allais, Pierre Uri, Robert Marjolin), installed teachers (Jean Marchal, Henri Guitton), or already famous (François Divisia, Gaëtan Pirou, Charles Rist). These names will be mostly associated, after war, to the implementation of Jean Monnet planning policies. The director of the CETE is Henri Denis, who has become a communist activist after the war as an introducer of Marxism at the Sorbonne …
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