Description: How did contemporary microeconomic theory emerge? Who were its chief architects? Conventional wisdom points largely to the work of Alfred Marshall (1842-1924) and his colleagues in England in the late nineteenth century. In this highly original and important contribution to the history of economic thought, Robert Ekelund and Robert Hebert convincingly argue that the intellectual tradition of microeconomic inquiry was initiated by members of the Corps des Ingenieurs des Ponts et Chausses (French corps of state civil engineers), most notably Jules Dupuit (1804-66). Using documents previously unavailable in English, the authors present a cohesive and original picture of French economic thought that solidly documents the contributions of Dupuit and his colleagues. This is a seminal work about the foundations of modern microeconomics.

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