Quale «Economia politica» per l’Encyclopédie? Rousseau e Boulanger tra l’Economia politica degli antichi e dei moderni

Political Economy took on its modern meaning during the 18th century, when it became an independent science. This paper points out the active role played by the Encyclopédie of Diderot and d’Alembert in this process, debating on the relationship between the economic and the political sphere. The Encyclopédie was the ground where the ancient and the modern meanings of the term confronted themselves, as in the case of Rousseau, who wrote the article «Économie» in the 5th volume, and Quesnay, the most important exponent of Physiocracy and author of the articles «Fermiers» and «Grains». If Rousseau’s explanation, looking back to antiquity, proposed an idea of Political Economy as a kind of Science of Government, the physiocratic theory was based on the ‘Agricultural Kingdom’ according to Steiner’s definition. Finally, this paper takes into consideration another article, «Œconomie politique», as essential in order to to explain the Encyclopédie's position on the definition of the term. Ascribed to Nicolas Antoine Boulanger and hitherto overlooked, the article «Œconomie politique» was published in the 11th volume and dedicated to the description of a particular form of government: Theocracy