Charles Gide

Charles Gide
Charles Gide
Born	1847 Uzès
Died	1932 Paris
Occupation	Economist

Charles Gide (1847, Uzès, Gard – 1932) was a leading French economist and historian of economic thought. He was a professor at the University of Bordeaux, at Montpellier, at Université de Paris and finally at Collège de France.

Academic work

A founder of the Revue d'économie politique in 1887, Gide was a proponent of the French historical approach to economics.^[1]

Gide was one of the few supporters of Leon Walras, as they shared a social philosophy, social activism, and disdain for the "Manchester-style" economics of the journalistes.^[1] Gide later resisted the influence of Keynesian economics in France.^[1]

The Charles Gide Association for the History of Economic Thought website, in French, is at http://www.charlesgide.fr. In keeping with Gide's views, the association is free of any exclusive doctrinal, theoretical or epistemological bias.

Books

Social activism

As a Protestant Christian Socialist, Gide was at the center of progressive politics in France, supporting the université populaire movement in the aftermath of the Dreyfus Affair. He promoted the establishment of a School for Advanced Social Studies (Ecole superieure de sciences sociales) (1899). In addition, he served among the early faculty of the Ecole Supérieure de Journalisme de Paris^[2]. Together with the School for Social Studies, it was established in 1899 as one of three grandes écoles developing from the Collège libre de science sociales founded in 1895.

Gide supported the Union pour la Verite (League for Truth) created by Paul Desjardins^[3] in 1892 in support of the French officer Alfred Dreyfus during the political scandal, which aroused heated passions across the nation. Gide was interested in reform projects as well, such as the Alliance d’Hygiene Sociale (Social Hygiene League, created in 1905), and reported on the social economy exhibition at the Paris World's Fair in 1900.^[4]

Gide was a tireless champion of the cooperative movement: both agricultural and consumers' cooperatives during the first third of the 20th century. His book, Consumers' Co-operative Societies, which first appeared in French in 1904, and in English in 1921, is a classic in the field of co-operative economics, in the tradition of Co-operative Federalism.^[4]

Works

• Charles Gide - Écrits 1869-1886 (Charles Gide - Writings 1869-1886, Editions Harmattan/Committee for the edition of works of Charles Gide, Paris (1999)
• Principes d'economie politique, (1883) ISBN 9781412352512; tr. as Principles of Political Economy (1924); 26th ed., Paris, Librairie du Recueil Sirey (1931). On line ed. Marcelle Bergeron, École polyvalente Dominique-Racine de Chicoutimi, Ville de Saguenay.
• Économie sociale. Les institutions du progrès social au début du XXe siècle. Paris, Larose, 1905.
• Coopération et économie sociale 1886-1904 (1905). Patrice Devillers. éd. L’Harmattan

v. 4 (2001)

• Charles Gide, "Economic Literature in France at the Beginning of the Twentieth Century", The Economic Journal, Vol. 17, No. 66 (Jun., 1907), pp. 192–212. doi:10.2307/2220664
• Cours d'economie politique (1909); Paris, Librairie de la Société du Recueil Sirey, 5e édition, refondue et augmentée (1919) On line ed. Marcelle Bergeron, École polyvalente Dominique-Racine de Chicoutimi, Province de Québec.
• Les Societes Cooperatives de Consomption, (1904); tr. as Consumers' Co-operative Societies (1921).
• A History of Economic Doctrines from the Time of the Physiocrats to the Present Day, with Charles Rist; tr. R. Richards. London, George P. Harrap (1915).
• Les Colonies Communistes et Co-Operatives (1930).

References

1. ^ ^{a b c} "History of Economic Thought", The French Liberal School Website. Note: The French Liberal School had lost interest in serious economic theory by the 1830s.
2. ^ "Histoire", Ecole Supérieure de Journalisme de Paris website, accessed 4 July 2011
3. ^ Paul Desjardins
4. ^ ^{a b} Pierre-Yves Saunier, "Review of Marc Penin, 'Charles Gide 1847-1932. L’esprit critique'", History Net (H-Net)

Further reading

• Marc Penin. Charles Gide 1847-1932. L’esprit critique. Paris: l’Harmattan (1998). ISBN 2-7384-6072-0

External links

• "Charles Gide", French Wikipedia
• Charles Gide Association for the History of Economic Thought
• New School History of Economic Thought website, French Historical School
• Consumers' Co-operative Societies

See also

• History of Economic Thought

Persondata
Name	Gide, Charles
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1847
Place of birth	Uzès
Date of death	1932
Place of death	Paris