Public Credit, Capital, and State Agency: Fiscal Responsibility in German-Language Finanzwissenschaft

Abstract

This chapter discusses the evolution of German views on public debt 1850–1920, referring to three strands of secondary literature: (1) German retrospectives on public finance, (2) the historical literature with a public choice perspective, and (3) contributions to public/constitutional law, mainly referring to Lorenz von Stein. The skeptic view of public debt endorsed by authors of the second half of the period is shown to be related to politico-economic issues of state agency combined with new state functions, rather than to the rejection of Dietzel’s Proto-Keynesian macroeconomic reasoning.

Citation

Sturn, R. (2020), "Public Credit, Capital, and State Agency: Fiscal Responsibility in German-Language Finanzwissenschaft", Fiorito, L., Scheall, S. and Suprinyak, C.E. (Ed.) Research in the History of Economic Thought and Methodology: Including a Symposium on Public Finance in the History of Economic Thought (Research in the History of Economic Thought and Methodology, Vol. 38A), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 97-121. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0743-41542020000038A009