Wilhelm Röpke: Review of L’Italie économique (1922)

Wilhelm Röpke’s journal book review examines the two-volume survey of Italy’s economic development issued by the Milanese bank Credito Italiano for its twenty-fifth anniversary. Its central claim is that German public understanding has failed to register Italy’s economic transformation. Röpke presents the commemorative publication as a substantial corrective: a scientifically worthwhile account whose recognition of national achievement remains tempered by the postwar crisis.

Es ist eine in der deutschen Öffentlichkeit viel zu wenig bekannte und gewürdigte Tatsache, daß Italien in den letzten Jahrzehnten ein staunenswertes Tempo in seiner wirtschaftlichen Entwicklung eingeschlagen, seine industriellen und finanziellen Kräfte in demselben Maße entwickelt hat, wie es seine Landwirtschaft, die natürliche Grundlage seiner Volkswirtschaft, modernisierte und rationell gestaltete, und in der Intensivierung fast aller Erwerbszweige eine Stufe erreicht hat, die ihm ein Anrecht darauf gibt, zu den hochkapitalistischen Ländern der Welt gerechnet zu werden.

English translation: It is a fact far too little known and appreciated among the German public that Italy has, in recent decades, set an astonishing pace in its economic development, developed its industrial and financial strengths to the same extent as it modernized and rationally organized its agriculture, the natural foundation of its national economy, and attained a level of intensification in almost every branch of economic activity that entitles it to be counted among the world’s highly capitalist countries.

The decisive move is to understand Italian modernization across sectors. Agriculture remains the economy’s natural foundation, but its rationalization accompanies industrial and financial expansion rather than standing opposed to them. Italy’s changed economic standing consequently matters beyond national boundaries: it reshapes the country’s position in both the world economy and international politics. Germany has particular reason to attend to this development because, before the war, it occupied first place in Italy’s imports and exports.

Röpke then connects the publication’s institutional origin with its scope. Credito Italiano, which he places at the head of Italy’s credit banks, can legitimately emphasize its contribution to the preceding quarter-century’s development and associate that development with its own expansion. The second volume supplies photographs from the different branches of the economy; the first contains the substantive historical account. Although the review does not attempt a sector-by-sector digest, it singles out the discussions of foreign trade and the balance of payments as especially important for German readers. These subjects turn a bank’s anniversary publication into evidence about international economic relationships.

Kennzeichnend für den Wert der Festschrift ist zweierlei: die wissenschaftliche Reserviertheit des Textes und das Fehlen jeder ökonomischen Hurrastimmung, wie sie solchen Festschriften leicht eigen ist.

English translation: Two things characterize the value of the commemorative volume: the scholarly restraint of the text and the absence of any economic triumphalism of the kind to which such commemorative volumes are readily prone.

This judgment supplies the review’s critical standard. Commemorating growth is valuable when it does not obscure present vulnerability. Röpke stresses Italy’s precarious situation under the pressure of the world economic crisis and the diminished purchasing power of its foremost commercial partner, Germany. Tourism receipts and emigrants’ remittances no longer provide their previous positive contributions to the balance of payments. Uncertainty about the future international economy therefore qualifies any celebration of past progress.

The review closes by making this vulnerability a reason for guarded hope. Italy’s example demonstrates how national prosperity depends upon international purchasing power and cross-border income flows. Röpke does not offer a detailed policy programme; instead, he expects material economic relationships to exert pressure against the errors and passions obstructing them.

Sie nähren aber auch, gerade an dem Beispiel Italiens und an der Hand dieses Buches, die Hoffnung, daß die unerbittliche Logik der weltwirtschaftlichen Tatsachen sich ihren Weg durch das Gestrüpp der Irrtümer und Leidenschaften bahnen wird.

English translation: But they also nourish the hope, precisely through Italy’s example and with the guidance of this book, that the inexorable logic of the facts of the world economy will force its way through the thicket of errors and passions.

The review thus moves from recognition of Italy’s capitalist development to an argument about economic interdependence. Its praise rests on the publication’s capacity to document achievement without suppressing the international conditions on which its continuation depends.