Institute of Architecture and Construction
"Volgograd State Technical University"
Faculty of Distance Learning
Department of Management and Development of Urban Economy and Construction
Test
in the discipline: “History of economic doctrines”
on the topic: “The economic concept of Antoine de Montchretien”
Completed by a 1st year student
Groups EPiO-2017
Limanova K.A
Checked by: Yashchenko S. O., Ph.D. in Economics, Associate Professor of the Department of ES&G
Volgograd, 2018
Brief biography
Antoine Montchretien (1576-1621). The man who first introduced the term “political economy” into socio-economic literature was Antoine Montchretien, Sieur de Watteville. He was a poor French nobleman from the times of Henry IV and Louis XIII. Montchretien's life is filled with adventures worthy of Dartagnan. A poet, duelist, exile, close associate of the king, rebel and state criminal, he ended his life under the blows of swords and in the smoke of pistol shots, having been ambushed by his enemies. However, such an end was fortunate for the rebel, because if he had been captured alive, he would not have escaped torture and a shameful execution. even his body, according to the court verdict, was subjected to desecration: the bones were crushed with iron, the corpse was burned and the ashes were scattered to the wind.
Montchretien was one of the leaders of the uprising of French Protestants (Huguenots) against the king and catholic church. He died in 1621 at the age of 45 or 46, and his Treatise of Political Economy was published in 1615. in Rouen. It is not surprising that the Treatise was consigned to oblivion, and Montchretien's name was mixed with mud. Unfortunately, it so happened that the main source of biographical information about him is the biased and downright slanderous reviews of his ill-wishers. These reviews bear the stamp of brutal political and religious struggle. Montchretien was honored as a highwayman, a counterfeiter, a lowly greedy man who allegedly converted to the Protestant religion only in order to marry a rich Huthenot widow.
Almost 300 years passed before Montchretien's good name was restored, and his place of honor in the history of economic and political thought was firmly secured to him. Now it is clear that his tragic fate is not accidental. Participation in one of the Huguenot uprisings, which were to a certain extent a form of class struggle of the disenfranchised French bourgeoisie against the feudal-absolutist system, turned out to be a natural outcome of the life of this commoner by birth (his father was a pharmacist), a nobleman by chance, a humanist and a warrior by vocation.
Having received a good education for his time, Montchretien at the age of 20 decided to become a writer and published a tragedy in verse on an ancient plot. It was followed by several other dramatic and poetic works. It is also known that he composed the History of Normandy. In 1605, when Montchretien was already famous writer, he was forced to flee to England after a duel that ended in the death of his opponent.
A four-year stay in England played the same role in his life as a stay in Holland several decades later in Petty’s life: he saw a country with a more developed economy and more developed bourgeois relations. Montchretien begins to take a keen interest in trade, crafts, and economic policy. Looking at English customs, they mentally try them on to France. Perhaps the fact that in England he met many French Huguenot emigrants was important for his future fate. Most of them were artisans, many very skilled. Montchretien saw that their work and skill brought England considerable benefit, and France, forcing them to emigrate, suffered a great loss. Montchretien returned to France as a convinced supporter of the development of national industry and trade, a defender of the interests of the third estate. He began to put his new ideas into practice.
Having married a rich widow, he founded a hardware workshop and began selling his goods in Paris, where he had his own warehouse. But his main occupation was working on the Treatise. Despite the loud name, he wrote a purely practical essay, in which he tried to convince the government of the need for comprehensive patronage of French industrialists and kul-shams. Montchretien advocates customs protectionism - high duties on foreign goods so that their import does not interfere with national production.
Montchretien was one of the prominent representatives mercantilism. He thought of the country's economy primarily as an object of public administration. He considered foreign trade, especially the export of industrial and handicraft products, to be the source of the wealth of the country and the state (king).
Montchretien presented his work, which he dedicated to the young King Louis XIII and the Queen Mother, to the Keeper of the State Seal (Minister of Finance) immediately after its publication. Apparently loyal in form, the book was initially well received at court. Its author began to play a well-known role as a kind of economic adviser, and in 1617 he took the post of mayor in the city of Chatillon-on-Loire. He probably received nobility at this time. It is unknown when Montchretien converted to Protestantism and how he ended up in the ranks of the Huguenot rebels. He may have become disillusioned with the expectation that his projects would be actively and effectively carried out by the royal government and was outraged to see them instead fanning the flames of a new religious war. Perhaps he came to the conclusion that Protestantism was more consistent with his established principles, and, being a decisive and courageous man, he took up arms for it.
Contribution to economic science.
Montchretien's main merit is that he singled out economic problems as a special independent subject of study. By this he separated economic science from other social sciences, for the first time emphasizing the close relationship between politics and economics, it was Montchretien who dubbed political economy a work that included simple evidence about how the wealth of a nation is produced, distributed and exchanged, and which were systematically studied only one and a half centuries later.
But let us return to the Treatise of Political Economy. Why did Montchretien call his work that and was there any special merit in it? Hardly. The last thing he thought was that he was giving a name to a new science. This or a similar combination of words, so to speak, was in the air - in the air of the Renaissance, when many ideas and concepts of ancient culture were resurrected, rethought and given new life. Like any well-educated person of his time, Montchretien knew Greek and Latin and read ancient authors. In the Treatise, following the spirit of the times, he refers to them every now and then. Undoubtedly, he knew the meaning of the word saving And economy had in Xenophon and Aristotle in the writers of the 17th century. these words still meant housekeeping, family and personal management, a little later than Montchretien, an Englishman published a book called “Economic Observations and Advice.” The author defined economy as “the art of good management of home and fortune” and dealt, for example, with such a problem as a gentleman’s choice of a suitable wife. According to his “economic” advice, one should choose a lady as a wife who “will be as useful during the day as pleasant at night.”
Obviously, this was not exactly the kind of economy that interested Montchretien. All his thoughts were aimed precisely at the prosperity of the economy as state, national community. Of course, we were not talking about the state that Aristotle knew and depicted, But the affairs of this state remained affairs political. It is not surprising that before the word economical he defined political.
For a good 150 years after Montchretien, political economy was considered primarily as a science of state economy, about the economy of nation states, ruled, as a rule, by absolute monarchs. Only under Adam Smith, with the creation of the classical school of bourgeois political economy, its character changed, and it began to turn into a science about the laws of economics in general, in particular about the economic relations of classes. The German Friedrich List, an ardent nationalist in economics, had to emphasize his difference from the cosmopolitan universality of the classical school already in the 40s of the 19th century. Title your essay “National System of Political Economy.” If he had simply written “political economy,” he would not have been understood in the same way as Montchretien was understood two centuries earlier.
Montchretien's main merit, of course, is not that he gave his book such a successful title page. This was one of the first works in France and Europe specifically devoted to economic problems. It singled out and limited a special subject of research, different from the subject of other social sciences. French economist, author of the term “political economy”. Montchretien was one of the prominent representatives of mercantilism. He thought of the country's economy primarily as an object of public administration. He considered foreign trade, especially the export of industrial and handicraft products, to be the source of the wealth of the country and the state (king). Montchretien's main work is “Treatise of Political Economy” (1615). This was one of the first works in France and Europe specifically devoted to economic problems. It singled out and limited a special subject of research, different from the subject of other social sciences.
Economic theory as a science is the result of long historical development. At the origins economic science stands the Greek thinker Aristotle, who was the first economist to use the terms "economy" and "economics" in the same sense. Aristotle, for the first time in the history of economic science, analyzed the main economic phenomena and patterns of society of that time.
Economics received its name in the 17th century. The Frenchman Antoine Montchretien first introduced the term into socio-economic literature political economy: in In 1615 he published the Treatise of Political Economy. With this, Montchretien proclaimed that economic science deals with the economy, economy within the framework of national states (politics - state). However, Montchretien's main merit is that he singled out economic problems as a special independent subject of study. In this way he separated economics from other social sciences.
A century and a half after Montchretien, political economy was viewed primarily as the science of state management. Only with the creation of the classical school of bourgeois political economy, the founder of which was the English economist Adam Smith, did its character change, and it began to turn into a science about the laws of economics in general.
Montchretien's place in the history of economics is probably more a result of the title than of the content. Traicte de l'oeconomie. Never before have the words "political" and "economics" been combined on the title page of a volume purporting to be a treatise, which presupposes a systematic treatment of a single topic. For some, this is Montchretien's only merit; others believe that he was busy with the painstaking work of separating the analytical wheat from the chaff of factual data. Montchretien's contribution to economics, even if partly lacking in originality, introduced for the first time some important elements of what was to serve as the standard for the mercantilist way of thinking. Sharing the political creed of his contemporary Jean Bodin, Montchretien was nevertheless the first to add (to foreign wars) the search for wealth as a means of ensuring the stability of the social order of France, formed around the king. Traicte is one of the first works that explicitly questions the old Aristotelian claim about the independence of politics from (and its superiority over) other aspects of social life, including economic activity.
Labor is no longer under a curse, but is one of the factors of political stability, productive labor and the accumulation of wealth, Montchretien came to this logical conclusion: “the happiness of people lies mainly in wealth, and wealth lies in work.”
In addition to agriculture, in his study of the structure of society, Montchretien also turned to the study of industry and trade. Since exchange became the basis of most productive labor, sellers and "merchants" began to play a central coordinating role. Profit, being their main incentive, was to be encouraged and protected (by the state): merchants are more than useful, and their concern for income, which is carried out in work and industry, creates/is the cause of a large part of public wealth. For this reason, they should be forgiven for the love of gain and the desire for it.
From this naturally follows the statement of the mercantilists about the need for state assistance in improving the well-being of nations. For the first time emphasizing the close relationship between politics and economics, it was Montchretien who christened political economy a work that included simple evidence about how the wealth of a nation is produced, distributed and exchanged, and which were systematically studied only a century and a half later.
As an independent field of knowledge, we can talk about economic science only starting from the 16th-18th centuries. And the first attempts are theoretical, i.e. in the form of a certain system of views, describe economic activities associated with the ideas of the mercantilist school. Mercantilism as a theory spread widely in Europe and went through two stages in its development. Among the most famous mercantilists are the Englishmen T. Men and W. Stafford, the French F. Colbert and A. Montchretien, the Italian A. Scaruffi, the Spaniard Serra, the Russians A. Ordyn-Nashchokin and I. Pososhkov. The mercantilists reflected the ideology of the emerging bourgeoisie in the era of primitive accumulation of capital, and therefore tried to explore the problem - what is the wealth of society and how it can be increased. Answering this question, they come to the conclusion that wealth is money (gold and silver), and the source of its receipt was considered primarily foreign trade. Therefore, mercantilists focused on studying purely economic phenomena: foreign trade and trade balance, money and interest rates. The ideas of mercantilism became the basis of economic policy, which boiled down to protectionist measures and was carried out by almost all countries. However, mercantilism did not become a scientific theory, since it studied external economic forms, limiting itself to describing the appearance of their manifestation.
Political economy (this term for economic knowledge was introduced into scientific circulation by the mercantilist A. Montchretien, who published his “Treatise on Political Economy” in 1615) becomes a truly scientific theory in the works and ideas of representatives of the classical school of bourgeois political economy, which developed in the 17th-18th centuries. . The most famous of them were W. Petty (1623-1687), F. Quesnay (1694-1774), A. Smith (1723-1790), D. Ricardo (1772-1823). Their merit lay primarily in the fact that they were the first, and indeed from a scientific position, using the methodology of logical abstraction, to consider the development of society as a natural process, with its inherent internal laws, so they tried to penetrate into the essence of economic processes and phenomena, and were not limited only their external description. The undoubted merit of the classic of bourgeois political economy is the transfer of the study of the origin of wealth from the sphere of exchange to the sphere of production. And although this issue was considered by the classic in different ways (for example, the school of physiocrats led by F. Quesnay considered only agricultural production as a wealth-creating industry), they all correctly define the main sphere of enrichment - material production. This objectively reflected the interests of strengthening the economic and political dominance of the bourgeoisie, which then brought with it new, progressive relations.
Mercantilists (T. Men in England, A. Montchretien and J.B. Colbert in France) believed that income is created in the sphere of circulation, and the wealth of the nation lies in money - gold and silver. Therefore, they set the goal of the state’s economic policy to attract these metals to the country by all means. The source of wealth, in their opinion, was foreign trade.
Mercantilism arose on the eve of and during the great geographical discoveries, the seizure of colonies, the growing influence of cities and was divided into early and late (the first - until the middle of the 16th century, the second - the middle of the 17th - the beginning of the 18th century). The main thing in early mercantilism was the theory of monetary balance, aimed at increasing gold and silver in the country through legislation. In order to retain money, it was prohibited to export it abroad; foreign merchants were obliged to spend all the proceeds from the sale on the purchase of local goods. Late mercantilism was characterized by a system of active trade balance, which was ensured through the export of national goods abroad. At the same time, the demand was put forward: to export more than to import.
The decomposition of feudalism and the emergence of capitalism led to the emergence of an independent science - political economy.
(1575-1622) - French subject, the man who introduced scientific literature the term “political economy”, a representative of the physiocratic school. He was a poor French nobleman during the times of Henry VI and Louis XIII. M.'s life is filled with adventures worthy of d'Artagnan. A poet, duelist, exile, close associate of the king, rebel and state criminal, M. ended his life under the blows of swords and in the smoke of pistol shots, having been ambushed by enemies. However, such an end was luck for the rebel, because if he had been captured alive, he would not have escaped torture and shameful execution. Even his body was desecrated by the court: his bones were crushed with iron, his corpse was burned and the ashes were scattered to the wind. M. was one of the leaders of the uprising. French Protestants (Huguenots) against the king and the Catholic Church. He died in 1621 at the age of 45 or 46, and his “Treatise of Political Economy” was published in 1615 in Rouen. It is not surprising that the “Treatise...” was consigned to oblivion, and his name. M. mixed with dirt.
However, long before his death, M. visited England. Having become acquainted with the teachings of the mercantilists in England and having witnessed the rapid development of the English economy, trade, and crafts, M. became an active supporter of the development of national industry in France and the creation of a state economy, of which he tried to convince the king. To this end, in 1615 he published his only economic work, A Treatise of Political Economy for the King and Queen, dedicating it to the young Louis XIII and the Queen Mother. Like all mercantilists, M. advocates stimulating the export of goods and limiting their import. He compares foreign merchants to a pump that pumps its wealth out of the country. At the same time, he has a deeper view of the nature of wealth than simply identifying it with gold, which is reflected in the very title of his book. How to interpret this name? The word “economy” (the laws of home economics) was borrowed by him from the ancient Greeks. “Politeia” translated from Greek means social order. This means that “Treatise of Political Economy” can be translated as “Treatise on the Laws of Social Economy”. It is unlikely that M. imagined that he was giving a name to a new science. However, with the term “political economy” he clearly wanted to emphasize the importance for France of creating a national economy. M.'s merit lies not only in the fact that he gave his book such a successful name. The main thing is different: it was one of the first works in Europe specifically devoted to economic problems. It highlighted a special subject of research, different from the subject of other social sciences. Political economy was declared to be the science of the laws of development of the social economy.
With the publication of M.'s book, economic science has been developing as political economy for more than 300 years. And only in the last century did alternative terminology appear: “economics”, mainstream, economic theory, etc.
Lua error in Module:CategoryForProfession on line 52: attempt to index field "wikibase" (a nil value).Antoine Montchretien de Watteville(fr. Antoine Montchrestien de Watteville ; -) - French playwright and economist who first proposed the term “political economy”.
Biography
The son of a pharmacist, Montchretien was orphaned early, and from a young age he studied literary creativity. He led a hectic lifestyle; Having killed his opponent in a duel, he was forced to flee to England, where he was warmly received by King James I, the son of Mary Stuart, the heroine of the most famous of his works. James I even sent a letter to King Henry IV asking for Antoine's pardon. A few years later, Montchretien returned to France a changed man. He left poetry and devoted himself to another activity - translation psalms and writing a History of Normandy. He founded a hardware workshop in Châtillon-on-Marne, specializing in the production of cutlery. He sided with the Protestants; died in battle; his body was burned.
Dramatic creativity
Montchretien the playwright is considered one of Corneille's predecessors and at the same time the heir to the stage traditions of the French Renaissance. At the age of twenty, he composed the first of his tragedies - “Sofonisba" ( Sophonisbe, ); it is based on Trissino's play of the same name and was then radically revised on the advice of François Malherbe. In 1601 he published a collection of tragedies: “The Lacedaemonian Women” ( Les Lacenes), "David" ( David), "Aman" (Aman), "The Scottish Woman, or Mary Stuart" ( L'Ecossaise ou Marie Stuart) and a number of others. In addition, Montchretien wrote the prose “Pastoral” ( La Bergerie) and the poem "Susanna". The last of Montchretien's tragedies, Hector ( Hector, ), is marked by mature dramatic skill.
Economic views
Interest in economics arose during his stay in England, where Montchretien fled in 1605 after a duel that ended in the death of his opponent.
I stood shocked, not wanting to believe that the most wonderful Empire on Earth was destroyed so simply!.. Again, it was a different time. And it was difficult for me to judge how strong people were then. But the Cathars had the purest, never giving up, proud hearts, which allowed them to go, without breaking, to the terrible human fires. How could they believe that the Golden Mary would allow this?..
The idea of the church was, indeed, devilishly brilliant... At first glance, it even seemed that it brought only goodness and love to the “new” Cathars, not allowing them to take someone’s life. But this is only at first glance... In reality, this “bloodless” teaching completely disarmed Qatar, making them helpless against the cruel and bloodthirsty army of the Pope. After all, as far as I understood, the church did not attack while the Cathars remained warriors. But after the death of the Golden Mary and the brilliant plan of the “holiest” fathers, the churchmen only needed to wait a little while until the Cathars became helpless at will. And then - to attack... When there is no one left to resist. When only a small handful of Knights Templar remain. And when it will be very easy to defeat Qatar. Without even staining your tender, sleek hands with their blood.
These thoughts made me feel sick... Everything was too easy and simple. And very scary. Therefore, in order to escape from sad thoughts at least for a minute, I asked:
– Have you ever seen the Key of the Gods, Sever?
- No, my friend, I saw him only through Magdalene, as you saw him now. But I can tell you, Isidora, he cannot fall into “dark” hands, no matter how many human sacrifices it may cost. Otherwise, there will be no such name anywhere else - Midgard... This is too great a force. And if it falls into the hands of the Thinking Dark Ones, nothing will stop their victorious march across the remaining Lands... I know how hard it is to understand this with your heart, Isidora. But sometimes we have to think clearly. We are obliged to think for everyone who comes... and make sure that they certainly have somewhere to come...
– Where is the Key of the Gods now? Does anyone know this, North? – Anna, who had been silent until now, suddenly asked seriously.
“Yes, Annushka, partly, I know.” But I can’t tell you about this, unfortunately... One thing I am sure of is that the day will come when people will finally prove worthy, and the Key of the Gods will sparkle again at the top of the Northern Country. But it will be another long hundred years before this happens...
– But we will die soon, so why should you be afraid, Sever? – Anna asked sternly. – Tell us, please!
He looked at her in surprise and, after waiting a little, slowly answered.
- You're right, honey. I think you deserve to know this... After the brutal death of Golden Maria, Radan took the Key of the Gods to Spain to hand it over to Svetodar. He believed that, even being so young, Svetodar would preserve the treasure entrusted to him. If necessary, even at the cost of your precious life. Much later, as an adult, going in search of the Wanderer, Svetodar took with him a wondrous treasure. And then, after sixty long and difficult years, already leaving home, he decided that it would be safer and more correct to leave the Key of the Gods there, in the Northern Country, in order to avoid possible trouble in his native Occitania. He did not know what news awaited him at home. And he didn’t want to risk the Key of the Gods.
– So, the Key of the Gods was in the Northern Country all this time? – Anna asked seriously, as if confirming what she had heard.
(fr. Antoine de Montchrestien, 1576-1621) - French playwright and economist who first proposed the term "political economy".
The son of a pharmacist, Montchretien was orphaned at an early age and was engaged in literary work from a young age. He led a hectic lifestyle; Having killed his opponent in a duel, he was forced to flee to England and returned to his homeland only thanks to the intervention of King James I, the son of the heroine of the most famous of his works - Mary Stuart. He founded a hardware workshop in Châtillon-on-Marne, specializing in the production of cutlery. He took the side of the Protestants; died in battle; his body was burned.
Scientific achievements
Interest in economics arose during his stay in England, where Montchretien fled in 1605 after being killed in a duel.
In 1615, Montchretien published his Treatise on Political Economy ( Traite d'economie politique), dedicating it to Marie de Medici. Montchretien did not write economic works either before or after. Characterizing the degree of independence of the treatise, in 1911 the Encyclopedia Britannica concluded that it “ mainly based on the works of Jean Bodin" The treatise contains a number of recommendations for the novice entrepreneur. The country's economy is considered as an object of public administration. The source of the country's wealth is foreign trade, especially the export of industrial and handicraft products. Foreigners were compared to a pump pumping wealth out of France. Their expulsion and the development of domestic industry were proposed; state intervention in economic life, the collection of taxes and the appropriation of even trade profits were approved.
Montchretien attached paramount importance to " natural wealth“(bread, salt, wine, etc.), since it is not the amount of gold that makes the state rich, but “the availability of items necessary for life.”
Montchretien introduced the term "political economy" to denote the science of economics, since, following Xenophon and Aristotle, the term " economy"was used primarily in the sense of housekeeping and personal household management. It was necessary to highlight the problems of managing the state economy, a science that studies processes occurring on the scale of the entire national economy. Following Montchretien and up to late XIX century, political economy meant the science of state economy, the economy of individual states. However, political economy is presented by Montchretien as a set of rules of economic activity.
Note 1
Antoine Montchretien de Watteville (1576 - 1621) was born into a poor noble family of a pharmacist in the French commune of Falaise (Lower Normandy).
Montchretien was orphaned at an early age, but this did not prevent him from receiving a good education for that time. During his relatively short life (he died at the age of 45 or 46), Montchretien was engaged in literary work (he was a writer, playwright, poet, translator), studied history (he owned the historical work “History of Normandy”), politics, and economics.
Reviews from contemporaries are the main source of biographical information about Montchretien, and in most cases his contemporaries were his detractors. They characterized him as a close associate of the king, an exile, a rebel, a state criminal, a robber, a counterfeiter. To avoid punishment, Montchretien fled from France to England, but returned a few years later.
According to contemporaries, Montchretien led the uprising of the Huguenots (French Protestants) against the king and the Catholic Church. Montchretien was also accused of the fact that he, being a low self-seeker, allegedly adopted the Protestant religion for the sake of profit and marriage to a rich Huguenot widow.
Montchretien's turbulent lifestyle led to his death during the rebellion. According to the court verdict, his body was crushed and burned, and the ashes were scattered to the wind.
Contribution to the economy
While in England for four years, Montchretien saw in this country a more economically developed power and more developed bourgeois relations. He begins to be interested in trade, crafts, and economic policy.
In England, Montchretien met many French Huguenot emigrants, most of whom were skilled artisans. Montchretien noted that their labor and skill were economically beneficial to England, but France suffered economic losses, forcing the Huguenots to emigrate.
Looking at the English economy, Montchretien mentally tried on these features for France, so he returned to his native country as a convinced supporter of the development of national trade and industry, as well as the protection of the interests of merchants and industrialists.
Returning to France, Montchretien left his previous studies and began to put his new ideas into practice. He married a wealthy widow and founded a cutlery workshop in Châtillon-on-Marne. He sold his goods in Paris. However, his main occupation was working on "Treatise of Political Economy", which came out in 1615. This work brought him fame as an economist, but this happened after almost 300 years, since this work was forgotten due to the bad reputation of its creator.
The Treatise is a purely practical work in which the author tried to convince the country's government of the need for comprehensive protection of French industrialists and traders. Montchretien advocated the introduction of high customs duties on foreign goods. Customs protectionism, in his opinion, was necessary to protect national production from foreign goods. At the same time, Montchretien advocated “natural wealth, that is, the production of agricultural products.
