3,015 works, 150 years of economic thought. Each one summarized and searchable, with cited passages inside.
Compulsory attendance can put students in lecture halls, but what makes them study law? In Unsere Rechtsstudien (1887), Sigmund Feilbogen treats student disengagement as a problem of educational design rather than discipline alone. Drawing on examination coaching and observations of French and English institutions, he asks how Austrian universities can cultivate independence in beginners newly released from school supervision. His striking proposal is to introduce criminal law early: its connections with public controversy and moral judgment could awaken an interest that later sustains historical study. Tutorials and regular written examinations would support, rather than supplant, academic freedom. The work offers a concrete account of the tension between professional preparation and intellectual breadth—and of why freedom to learn requires more than the removal of constraints.
An idea’s first appearance does not explain its power to reshape a discipline. In this 1890 essay, Sigmund Feilbogen asks why Adam Smith transformed political economy when David Hume had already advanced many similar propositions. His answer shifts attention from priority to proof, conceptual organization, and economic judgment. Hume, he argues, defended commerce chiefly for its contribution to state power and cultural refinement; Smith made productive efficiency a criterion for assessing it. Feilbogen respects Hume’s humane opposition to slavery and commercial hostility while questioning whether refinement can settle economic disputes. The comparison offers a concrete account of how argumentative order, evidence, and a focus on production can turn dispersed insights into a science—rather than merely a collection of anticipations.