Wakefield, Edward Gibbon (1796–1862)

Abstract

Wakefield was born in London on 20 March 1796, the eldest son of Edward Wakefield, a radical Quaker philanthropist, statistician, and author of a standard work on Ireland which was highly regarded by Ricardo, James Mill and other members of the philosophic radical circle. His son was to become one of the more colourful characters to inhabit the margins of the history of economic debate, and can be variously described as a publicist, politician and author. Apart from his practical and frequently controversial contributions to the development of Australia, Canada and New Zealand, he left a distinctive mark in the annals of classical political economy during the middle third of the 19th century.

This chapter was originally published in The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics, 2nd edition, 2008. Edited by Steven N. Durlauf and Lawrence E. Blume