Abstract
Tracy saw economic inequality as a problem to be understood and tackled, not simply as an eternal fact of life. He recognised that there were different levels of inequality, some more readily overcome than others. What types of inequality were least acceptable to him? As a political liberal, Tracy was particularly troubled by social conditions which prevented men from exercising their natural rights to life, liberty and property. Slavery or bondage was the worst form of inequality; it was incompatible with “civilised” society, in Tracy’s view. The second type of inequality which he attacked was inequality of instruction, skills or knowledge. While it was obvious that everyone had different talents and instructional needs, it was necessary for all men and women to receive a basic instruction to equip them for citizenship and their occupation. Ignorance was the servant of repressive élites.
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Notes
Traité, p. 175. On the Le Chapelier law of 1791, see J. Godechot, Les Institutions de la France sous la Révolution et I’Empire (Paris, 1951), pp. 181 ff.
Cf. Dupont de Nemours, Abrégé des principes de l’économie politique, p. 383; Baudeau, Premiere introduction, pp. 740ff, 803ff.
On the liberal and idéologue belief in philanthropy and sympathy for the deserving poor, cf. Chamfort, Oeuvres complétes (Paris, 1808), vol. II, pp. 116–120; R. Fargher, The ‘Décade Philosophique’, pp. 291 ff; J. Kitchin, Un journal ‘philosophique’. 201–3.
Cabanis, Quelques principes et quelques vues sur les secours publics, in Oeuvres philosophiques, vol. II, pp. 1–63. For the eighteenth-century background to the discussion of poverty, cf. M. Leroy, Histoire des idées sociales, vol. II, chapter 12; O. Hufton, “Towards an understanding of the poor in eighteenth-century France”, in French Government and Society 1500–1850, ed. Bosher (London, 1973), pp. 145–165.
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© 1985 Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Dordrecht
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Head, B.W. (1985). The Problem of Economic Inequality. In: Ideology and Social Science. Archives Internationales D’Histoire Des Idees/International Archives of the History of Ideas, vol 112. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-5159-4_8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-5159-4_8
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