Wilhelm Georg Friedrich Roscher

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Wilhelm Georg Friedrich Roscher (October 21, 1817 - June 4, 1894), German economist, was born at Hanover.

He studied at Göttingen, where he became a member of Corps Hannovera, and Berlin, and obtained a professorship at Göttingen in 1844 and subsequently at Leipzig in 1848.

The main origins of the historical school of political economy may be traced to Roscher. Its fundamental principles are dated, though with some hesitation, and with an unfortunate contrast of the historical with the philosophical method, in his Grundriss zu Vorlesungen über die Staatswirtschaft nach geschichtlicher Methode (1843).

Roscher tried to establish the laws of economic development by using the historical method from the investigation of histories legal, political, cultural and other aspects.

Roscher developed a cyclical theory where nations and their economies pass though youth, manhood and senile decay.

“The method of a science is of greater significance by far than any single discovery, however amazing the later may be.” This was in direct contrast to the English traditional economist who believed that the principals of a science were only exposed long after they had performed their duties.

This short study was afterwards expanded into his great System der Volkswirthschaft, published in five volumes between 1854 and 1894, and arranged as follows:

vol. i., Die Grundlagen der National Ökonomie, 1854 (trans. by JJ Lalor, Principles of Political Economy, Chicago, 1878) Volume One Volume Two
vol. ii., Die Nationalökonomik des Ackerbaues und der verwandten Urproduktionen,, 1859
vol. iii., Die Nationalökonomik des Handels und Gewerbfleisses, 1881
vol. iv., System der Finanzwissenschaft, 1886
vol. v., System der Armenpfiege und Armenpolitik, 1894.

His Geschichte der Nationalökonomie in Deutschland (1874) is a monumental work.

He also published in 1842 an excellent commentary on the life and works of Thucydides.

See T. Roscher, Zur Geschichte der Familie Roscher in Niedersachsen (Hanover, 1892); Brasch, Wilhelm Roscher und die sozialwissenschaftlichen Strömungen der Gegenwart (Leipzig, 1895).