Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0
Author-Name: Francesco Boldizzoni
Author-Email:
Author-Workplace-Name: Università Bocconi - Dipartimento di Economia politica 
Title: Davanzati e Hobbes: nascita e diffusione di un paradigma (XVI-XVIII secolo) (Davanzati e Hobbes: birth and spread of a paradigm, 16th to 18th centuries)
Abstract:  The formative stages of economic science, in the early modern period, can be roughly broken down into three phases: 
medical, iatromechanical, and physico-deductive, all being part of a same paradigm. 
This paper traces the origins of economic modelling, related to the advent of the individualistic
approach, through telling an unknown story. It argues that the idea of economics as social medicine
took form in Renaissance Italy, under the influence of Florentine Platonism. Then in the 17th
century, it was exported to England, becoming part of Petty’s and the arithmetic politicians’ background.
At the core of this process was Hobbes’ reception of Davanzati – the father of political
anatomy as well as of the notion of artificial man – during his voyages through Italy, where he also
absorbed Galilean philosophy. Between 17th and 18th century, Italian economics shifted to physics: by adopting a geometrical
method, it grew up and got refined but, in spite of this, it lost some of its international appeal, since
a series of political, economic, and cultural transformations had led to a change of balance between
the European powers. On the other hand, the Physiocratic system (Quesnay’s organicism) is here presented as the sole
historical alternative to constructivist pre-classical economics.
Classification-JEL: B31; B11; B00
Keywords: Davanzati; Hobbes; economics and medicine; economics and physics; geometrical method; pre-classical economic thought (Davanzati; Hobbes; economia e medicina; economia e fisica; metodo geometrico;
pensiero economico preclassico)
Journal: Il Pensiero Economico Italiano
Pages: 9-29
Volume: 13
Issue: 1
Year: 2005
File-URL: http://www.libraweb.net/articoli.php?chiave=200506301&rivista=63
Handle: RePEc:pei:journl:v:13:y:2005:1:1:p:9-29