Einaudi e la storia economica in Italia

The essay reconstructs Luigi Einaudi’s contribution to shaping economic history in Italy during the first half of the Twentieth century, situating it within the international debate between economists and historians and the tensions that accompanied the emergence of economic history as an autonomous field in the Italian context. Although skeptical of the “historical school” of economics, he upheld the unity of factual and intellectual history, assigning economic doctrines a central role in the interpretation of historical processes. The «Rivista di storia economica» (1936-1943) became both a forum for dialogue between economists and historians and an expression of his conception of the discipline.