19th conference of the Charles Gide Society, University Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, 7-9 July 2022

The 19^th conference of the Charles Gide Society will take place at the University Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne from the 7^th to the 9^th of July 2022. This event, organized by PHARE (Philosophie, Histoire et Analyse de la Pensée Econonmique, University Paris 1), LED (Laboratoire d’Economie Dyonisien, University Paris 8) and CES (Centre d’Economie de la Sorbonne, University Paris 1) will address the topic “Happiness and Unhappiness of the Economic Agent”.

Emerging during the French and Scottish enlightenments, political economy was developed as a narrative of the origins, which presented history as taking us away from unhappiness and progressing towards a future of happiness. The stages theories of Smith or Turgot illustrate this perspective. During the same period, the philosophy of Rousseau presented an opposite view, fledging society being characterized by happiness from which civilization led us away. These considerations were part of an empiricist philosophy of knowledge inspired by Locke and Condillac, stressing that human beings were more sensible to pain than to pleasure. What has become of these ways of relating happiness and unhappiness, pleasure and pain, on the one hand, and the progress of wealth and civilization, on the other, during the process of economic development?

The complete call for papers is available here.