Jérôme-Adolphe Blanqui

Jérôme-Adolphe Blanqui (November 21 1798, Nice - January 28 1854, Paris) was a French economist. His most important contributions were made in labour economics, economic history and especially the history of economic thought, in which field his 1837 treatise has been the first major work.

He was a disciple of Jean-Baptiste Say to whom he succeeded in 1833 to the chair of political economy at the Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers, and a free trader.

He was born at Nice in November, 1798. He began his career as an instructor, giving his time to chemistry and other sciences allied to medicine, acting as assistant professor of the humanities in a famous school-L'Institution Massin. This brought him into connection with Say, who procured for young Blanqui the chair of History and Industrial Economy at the School of Commerce in Paris. In 1830, he rose to the position of director of this important school, and in 1833, he succeeded Say in the professor's chair in the Conservatory of Arts and Trades. Blanqui stood in the foremost rank among the economists of his day. He advocated principles of commercial freedom but also showed sympathy for the working class. As a writer, he was noted for research, lucidity, occasional sallies of wit, frequent passages of great brilliancy, and at times a sustained eloquence of diction.

His major work is "Histoire de l'économie politique en Europe depuis les anciens jusqu'à nos jours" (1837), translated in English in 1880 as "History of Political Economy in Europe". His other publications include "Résumé de l'histoire du commerce et de l'industrie" (1826), "Précis élémentaire d'économie politique"(1826), "De la situation économique et morale de l'Espagne" (1846) and "Les classes ouvrières en France" (1848).

Besides a great number of journalistic articles, Blanqui published: Travels in England and Scotland (1824); Journey to Madrid (1826); A series of Reports on the Products of French Industry in 1827 (1827); The English Minister Huskisson, and his Economic Reform; Report on the Economic and Moral Condition of Corsica (1838); Report on the Economic Condition of the French Possessions in Algeria (1840); Travels in Bulgaria (1841); Considerations on the Social Condition of European Turkey (1841); Report on the World's Fair in London (1850); and the Life and Work of Jean Baptiste Say. In addition a series of interesting letters between Blanqui and M. Emile de Girardin, in which free trade and protection were discussed, appeared in 1846 and 1847.

References

*"Blanqui, Jérôme-Adolphe", in "", Eatwell, Milgate, Newman (eds.), 1987.
*McCulloch, J.R. (1845). "The Literature of Political Economy"
*Schumpeter, J.A. (1954). "History of Economic Analysis"

1911 [http://encyclopedia.jrank.org/BLA_BOS/BLANQUI_JEROME_ADOLPHE_1798_185.html Article J.A. Blanqui]