author
Wilhelm Roscher
1817–1894
A leading figure in the German historical school of economics, this nineteenth-century scholar argued that economic life can only be understood through history, institutions, and real social conditions. His work helped push political economy away from abstract formulas and toward the study of how societies actually develop.
3 Audiobooks
Zur Geschichte der englischen Volkswirthschaftslehre aus dem III. Bande der Abhandlungen der Königlich Sächsischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften
by Wilhelm Roscher
Principles of Political Economy, Vol. 2
by Wilhelm Roscher
Principles of Political Economy, Vol. 1
by Wilhelm Roscher
About the author
Born in Hanover on October 21, 1817, Wilhelm Georg Friedrich Roscher became one of the best-known German economists of his century. He studied at Göttingen and Berlin, and after teaching at Göttingen, he moved to the University of Leipzig in 1848, where he spent most of his career.
Roscher is remembered as an early leader of the German historical school. Instead of treating economics as a set of fixed universal laws, he emphasized the importance of history, culture, and institutions in shaping economic life. That approach made him an important voice in nineteenth-century debates about political economy and social development.
He died in Leipzig on June 4, 1894. Although later economists often moved in more abstract directions, Roscher's work remains a key part of the story of how economics developed as a discipline in Europe.