Summary: This article aims to better understand how French and French-speaking economists analyzed the gold standard in the 1930s. At least two camps can be distinguished: the monetary-nominalist economists of the positivist school (Nogaro, Simiand as well as, to a lesser degree Aftalion) and the “metallist” economists (Rist and Rueff). For the latter, gold is endowed with something essential, if not essentialist, as it anchors money in reality, makes it possible to distinguish money from credit and participates in the value reserve function of especially currency. On the contrary, the rally of positivist nominalists toward the gold standard was temporary, and based upon their belief that the time had not yet come to do without gold, since, politically, they were wary of the “directed currency”. Among all, adherence to the gold standard also seemed to hinge around their desire to maintain France’s world rank. Finally, one should not overlook the moral element underlying the notion of the durability of contracts, which is so important for economists, most of whom were trained as lawyers in the continental sense of the term.
In the 1930s: When French economists were wondering about the reasons for their support for the gold standard
Fancis Clavé
Introduction
French economists in the inter-war years were often seen as supporters of the gold standard. Is it because after the Second World War two major proponents of the gold standard, Charles Rist (1874-1955) and Jacques Rueff (1896-1978), were French; or were there deeper reasons? This article seeks to answer this question by examining how French economists used to position themselves on the gold standard issue between 1933 and 1939, i.e. more or less between the period when the pound sterling broke away from gold (1931) and when the Bretton Woods system was introduced (1944). The study will be conducted mainly on the basis of discussions held on these themes during the annual conferences of French-speaking economists, who will be presented in the first part. It also examines the main protagonists’ states of research in the debates on the gold standard. A second part presents the participants’ analyses of the challenges economic development pose to the gold standard.
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Finally, in the third part, we will discuss the reasons why, for all that, most French economists opted for the gold standard. I. Presentation of the discussion framework and of participants
In this section, after presenting the various congresses and major participants in the debates, we will present the status of their work on currency at the time their meetings began.
1. The congresses of French-speaking economists.
The French-speaking economists’ congress was founded at the end of the 1920s, on the occasion of a meeting between Gaétan Pirou – then economics professor in Bordeaux – and Maurice Ansiaux of the University of Brussels (Clavé 2018). Their aim was to provide a forum for discussion to professors of economics who were suffering from a degree of isolation at the time. The meetings were structured around the presentation of two reports on two themes, followed with a discussion among participants on the proposed topics. Each theme was the subject of a report published in the Revue d'économie politique, while oral presentations and discussions were transcribed, from 1933 onwards, in a document called Travaux des économistes de langue française. From a historical point of view, these publications provide information on participants’ “live” comments and help better understand their thoughts and work.
The congresses brought together the then most renowned French-speaking economists. The economics professors at French law faculties were the most numerous. Here are some of the most famous members: Charles Rist (1874-1955), Bertrand Nogaro (1880-1950), Gaétan Pirou (1886-1946) and Jean Lescure (1882-1947), who presided with Maurice Ansiaux in the organization of the congresses. Among the French participants, it is also worth noting the presence of lawyers specializing in public finance such as Gaston Jèze (1869-1953) and Edgar Allix (1874-1938), as well as economists who, after training at the Ecole normale supérieure, turned to economics and became professors at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (Adolphe Landry (1874-1956), François Simiand (1973-1935)). Finally, still among the French, must be mentioned economists from the Ecole Polytechnique (Clément Colson (1853-1956), François Divisia (1889-1964) and Jacques Rueff (1896-1978). On the Belgian side, three universities were well-represented: the University of Brussels with Maurice Ansiaux (1869-1943), Boris Chlepner (1890-1964) and Leener (1879-1965); the Catholic University of Louvain with Baudhuin (1894-1977) and Dupriez (1901-1988); the University of Liège with Mahaim (1865-1938) and Dechesne (1893-1955). On the Swiss side, the
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University of Geneva was represented by William Rappard (1883-1958) Director of the Institut Universitaire des Hautes Études Internationales de Genève.
It might be asked why the publication of the debates only began in 1933, though these congresses started in 1926. A remark made by François Simiand in 1935 seems to imply there was a willingness on the part of university professors to assert themselves against the X-Crise (Clavé 2018). It is reasonable to assume that internationally recognized financial and monetary affairs experts from law schools – such as Dean Allix, who was one of the experts responsible for drafting the Dawes Plan on War Reparations, or Gaston Jèze and Charles Rist, who designed the Poincaré stabilization – have, in a way, sought to affirm their presence in the debates at the time. This is all the more plausible as François Simiand, who mentioned this possibility, gave a conference at X-Crise in May 1933, when he met with a degree of hostility from Polytechnicians who blamed him for an approach to the economy they considered too “passive” (Froberg 2000, p. 165).
Looking at the context1 (see Appendix 1), it should be noted that, until 1929-1930, there was a consensus in favour of the gold standard. England reverted to it in 1925; Belgium in 1926; and France in 1928. In 1931, England’s decision to abandon the gold standard completely changed the situation and caused the de facto consensus around the gold standard to collapse. Indeed, while the nominalists’ researches – since the publication by Georg Friedrich Knapp of his book The State Theory of Money (1905), followed after the war with Hawtrey’s and Keynes’s works (Blanc 2000, p10) – have laid the intellectual foundations for abandoning the gold standard, these were only studies, not a political decision by one of the major powers. It should also be noted that from the early 1930s onwards, the German currency became a “directed currency”, at the service of a tyrannical government, which could only rekindle congressmen’s fears of nominalism, which put the currency at the beck and call of the State; it should be recalled that congressmen did not only study monetary problems, they also repeatedly tackled the various economic experiments of totalitarian countries like Germany or the USSR (Table 1). The gold standard issues were discussed five times between 1933 and 1939. In 1933, the congress participants focused on a report on the gold standard by Bertrand Nogaro. In 1935, on the “monetary” theme about the evolution of credit. In 1937, on monetary stability and, in 1939, on value standards and on stabilization funds.
1 . For more precisions see Appendix 1 and Diagram 1. 3
2. The renewal of currency studies before and after the First World War
Two regular participants in these congresses, Maurice Ansiaux and Bertrand Nogaro, were interested in monetary problems and the gold standard, even before the First World War. In 1892, Maurice Ansiaux published an article on the monetary issue in Belgium where, against bimetallism, he promoted the gold standard, a system that, according to Professor Chlepner (1956, p. 114) – one of his friends and colleague at the University of Brussels – “he remained faithful to all his life”. While he remained faithful to the gold standard, it is nevertheless indisputable that, in what is considered as his most important work in monetary theory, he showed that, contrary to common belief at the time, the gold standard does not work automatically. He made this observation while trying to understand why, though the gold standard was the rule, the Belgian franc was depreciated against the French franc. This is when he highlighted the role of the discount mechanism. Let us now look at the research conducted by the French: as early as 1905, Bertrand Nogaro worked on the subject of gold and, in the Paris Journal of Political Economy, published in 1906 an article entitled: Contribution à une théorie réaliste de la monnaie. A study that comes to a twofold conclusion: 1) Gold distribution is not automatic (Nogaro 1906, p. 722); 2) Exchange rate fluctuations do not depend on the currency itself but on the “ratio between the stock of gold made available to those who have to make payments abroad, in other words the balance of trade”. In this article, Nogaro claimed to follow a French method, which he dubbed realistic and that he contrasted on one hand with an Anglo-American school based on abstract principles, and on the other hand with the purely empirical German historical school (Nogaro 1906, p. 681).
Inflation and the monetary disorders that followed WWI led economists to focus on these issues, which had, until then, been reserved for rare specialists (Lhomme 1957, p. 357). Bertrand Nogaro was the first economist (among those studied here) to publish a book on currency entitled “La Monnaie et les phénomènes monétaires contemporains (1924)”. In the second edition of this book, in 1935, he did mention the possibility of an international currency, but more as a theoretical possibility than as a reality. He reminded readers that gold “undoubtedly owes largely to its physical properties and its possible market value... to have benefited from an almost universal tacit agreement that makes it the ultimate international exchange instrument” (Nogaro 1935, p. 406). In a series of articles, Albert Aftalion took up the criticism of Nogaro’s quantitative theory of currency. These articles were collected and modified and used as the basis for his book “Monnaie, Prix, Change”, published in 1927. 4
Aftalion’s own contribution to the quantitative theories of money and exchange lies in his introduction of psychology in the explanation of real phenomena. Indeed, he believed the value of a currency depends on a longstanding fidelity to a currency, so that a small fluctuation may be deemed as only temporary; on a number of individuals’ demands that are related to their proponents’ more or less favourable appreciation of the currency, and on forecasts that Aftalion considered central (Mouly 1952, p. 27). Rist (1927, pp. 1599-1590), in his review of the book, praised the scientific method of a “scientist-economist” as opposed to a “lawyer-economist”; yet, he criticized him on the grounds that he relied too much on circumstances (psychology) and not enough on the fundamental mechanism. Rueff, for his part, wrote a book entitled “Théorie des phénomènes monétaires” (1927), which Aftalion (1928, pp. 155-156) reviewed rather harshly in the Revue d'économie politique, while Rist referred to it with respect in his 1938 “Histoire des doctrines relatives au crédit et à la monnaie”.
In 1923-1924, François Simiand, in the journal L’Année Sociologique, published reviews of Nogaro’s book “La Monnaie et les phénomènes monétaires”, of “Die Seele des Geldes” by K. Elster, of “A tract on Monetary Reform” by Keynes, of “La déflation en pratique” by Rist, and finally, of Cassel’s “La monnaie et le change après 1914”. Concerning Nogaro’s book, in contrast to the author, he insists that, for a currency to be useful in an exchange, it must not only be an abstract symbol but also imply a general and sustained acceptance of it, in other words a “social belief” (Simiand 1923, p. 769). According to him, the reason why gold may have seemed to play a major role resulted not so much from its own qualities but from it being integrated into a belief system (Simiand 1923, p. 769). Therefore, for him, a monetary system cannot be established by decree, especially if we want a world currency (he will later told Nogaro that such a single currency might have been possible when the League of Nations was created, but not in the 1930s) (Travaux 1935, p. 231). In 1934, Simiand finally published (in the Sociological Year) his article “La monnaie réalité sociale”, in which he presented his vision of currency.
II. Perception of difficulties in maintaining the gold standard
This section will show, by analyzing the discussions reported in the Travaux, that French- speaking economists were perfectly aware of the difficulties related to reverting to the pre-war gold standard.
1. The gold standard before and after WWI.
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At the 1933 congress, Bertrand Nogaro presented the theme relating to the gold standard. In his presentation, he distinguished two gold standards: the one before 1914 and the one after WWI. Before the war, the “gold point” mechanism allowed the gold standard to ensure exchange rate stability. According to Nogaro, the mechanism worked as follows: since the currency is legally convertible into gold and since gold can be freely imported and exported, currency values were fixed in relation to gold. Such freedom prevailed because it was allowed by countries’ monetary laws ( Travaux 1933, p. 133). According to Nogaro in a monetary system, “the truly characteristic currency”, “the one lying at the basis of it” is “the one in which the subsidiary currencies that constitute the internal circulation must be convertible, when it comes to making payments between different countries” ( Travaux 1933, p. 132).
However, precisely after the war, in the “as to the exchange rate” gold standard, as Nogaro dubbed the “gold exchange standard”, gold stocks were insufficient, which required convertibility to be achieved both from gold and a national “currency portfolio” ( Travaux 1933, p.129). There was a hitch, though: these monetary reserves “might not be sufficiently convertible into gold and become unstable again”, all the more so in a period disrupted by war debts and the matter of “war reparations”. For Nogaro, this is the reason why England had to abandon the gold standard ( Travaux 1933, p.130). Opinions differed on this issue. For Rueff, the gold standard abandoned England, actually, because, with rigid downward wages, it had hardly any other option if it was to restore its competitiveness ( Travaux 1933, p. 166). For Aftalion, the Bank of England was the culprit, because it insisted on keeping the discount rate too low so as to help companies. ( Travaux 1933, p. 166). For Leduc, the English had opted out of the gold standard to re-balance the budget and, in this respect, he deemed France could benefit from such a policy.
According to Chlepner (Travaux 1933, pp.167-168), England made a double or quits gamble by opting out of the gold standard. Either others would not follow suit and Britain would have to backpedal, or they would, bringing about a new world standard. Just before the 1933 London conference, Lescure suspected the United States had doubts about the gold standard. Perhaps that is why he wished to state, in the introduction to the 1933 Report, that “French-speaking economists are unanimous in affirming the superiority of the gold standard”. This may have been somewhat of an overstatement, witness Gaston Leduc’s and Oualid’s doubts when they declared, “a gold-free economy will undoubtedly rejuvenate the economy” (Travaux 1933, p. 170).
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If we stick to the recommended solutions, Nogaro proposed to set the objective of “restoring exchange rate freedom on the basis of gold, taking into account its effective distribution and supplementing the conversion funds necessary to ensure exchange rate stability by means of reciprocal credit lines, which could perhaps be achieved in a more systematic way than has been done so far” (Travaux 1933, p. 137). Rist didn’t take any part in the whole discussion. For two possible reasons: He may have been absent during the half-day devoted to this theme. He may also not have wanted to participate in the discussion. However, if we refer to his “Histoire des doctrines financières et économique”, it is possible to get an idea of the remedies he was considering. For him, the important thing in a case like the one Nogaro described is to match the gold stock to the economic reality. This requires, on the one hand, creating incentives for producing more yellow metal and, on the other hand, adjusting the money supply to the gold stock through devaluations and stabilizations. Apparently, this is also Rueff’s standpoint in the discussions, as he did not criticise England for having devalued.
2. Gold standard, stability and the devaluation/deflation dilemma
For the majority of participants, monetary stability was really a good thing in itself. It was what made it possible to develop international trade, an important point at a time when resorting to currency for trade policy purposes was causing waves of protectionist escalation, which were also linked to the multiplication of strong and/or totalitarian regimes. But as Charles Rist clearly saw, for the gold standard to be stable after such intense monetary creation as during the First World War, it was necessary to devalue currencies against gold, which is what France achieved during the Poincaré stabilisation in 1928. It is also possible to try and implement deflation, but Rist, given the English example in 1925, was not supportive of it. This inflation/deflation dilemma was quite clearly raised at the congress when Germain- Martin, the then Flandin government’s Minister of Finance, called for their “advice” by asking them the following question:
If we devalue, that is, if we remove a determined weight of gold from a currency, are we actually getting closer to the settlement of the crisis or are we not embarking on a path that will make the crisis even worse (Travaux 1935, p. 181)?
This question, which puts the money-gold link at the forefront of concerns, sounds like one a gold standard holder might ask. Indeed, as “nominalist” Nogaro pointed out, what matters most is not the correlation with gold but the value of the franc against other currencies. Baudhuin (from the Catholic University of Leuve) did not bother with so many subtleties and did not mince his words: we must devalue. Actually, here is exactly how he put it.
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Energetic deflation, I said, can lead to port; but we see that, in all the countries of the gold- block, that it is no longer possible. Therefore, devaluation is a necessity. Whatever happens, we must do it as quickly as possible in order to shorten the very difficult period we are going through, a dangerous period that could raise social difficulties (Travaux 1935, p. 215)
If the minister wanted to know whether some politically influential Belgian academics were willing to devalue, he received a clear answer. In any case, shortly after the congress, Belgium changed governments. Paul Van Zeeland, an economics professor from Louvain, became Prime Minister and, assisted by Baudhuin and Dupriez, quickly devalued the Belgian franc; it is worth noting that Lescure, in his opening remarks to the proceedings, placed Germain Martin’s intervention under the heading ‘Europe’, as if the devaluation had been meant to maintain a European monetary unit around the gold block, which the three countries (Belgium, France and Switzerland) with representatives at the Congress belonged to. French economists were more reserved than those in Louvain, and refused to respond as a group, as they sought to maintain academic neutrality. For all that, discussions betray that while they did not believe that a deflation policy was effective, they feared that devaluation would lead to exchange rate instability. Landry (Travaux 1935, p.), Lescure (Travaux 1935, p. 222), Simiand (Travaux 1935, p. 235) argued that for a devaluation to succeed, public deficits should be limited but they doubted this was possible.
There also seems to be a moral element that explains the aversion to devaluation on the part of the economists present at the congress and therefore their concern to maintain the gold standard, which they consider more stable. In 1937, Mahaim de Liège asked the following question:
... I would like to add a consideration that has been mentioned very little here: granted, Mr. Jèze and Mr. Germain Martin have alluded to it two or three times; but among law school professors, don’t you think there is something essential to trying to achieve stabilization: it is the moral principle?
Jèze, Allix and Germain Martin immediately agreed. For Gaston Jèze, who participated in the Poincaré stabilisation, “devaluing the franc while keeping the same name is a bit of a scam (Travaux 1937, p.156). For Allix “monetary nominalism has obscured ideas”. When we read Rist’s (1938, p. 334) passage on G-F Knapp’s nominalist theory, we can understand what the submission of money to the state and its interests can morally shock lawyers, especially if we place ourselves in the context of the time.
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3. The problems raised by the evolution of banking techniques
This issue was discussed once in 1935 and a second time in 1939. In 1935, when it was one of the main themes of Maurice Ansiaux’s paper, L’évolution du crédit et le contrôle des banques and, in 1939, of the same rapporteur’s paper entitled, “How does the issue of value standards currently arise?”
The first communication focused very much on concerns that were to come to the fore after the 2007-2008 crisis: how to limit the power of banks to create credit. He noted in this regard that “credit has evolved from reality to fiction (Travaux 1935, p. 15)”. He argued that credit is originally based on real savings, on wealth, and serves above all as a vehicle for translation. On the contrary, in 1935 “everything is spiritualized” or almost so. Credit is no more than an exchange of promises, some on sight, others in the long term (Travaux 1939, p.16). Hence the temptation of banks to multiply loans, a temptation that is all the stronger as the legislator has allowed it to happen. This resulted in credit inflation that caused a price increase that did not benefit employees, resulting in chronic under-consumption and economic problems (Travaux 1939, p. 21). As a result, he was led to make recommendations similar in spirit to those made by economists after the early 2000s crisis: the establishment of regulations to contain the power of banks to create credit.
While in 1935, Maurice Ansiaux did not address the problems arising from the excessive creation of scriptural money against the gold standard, on the contrary, his 1939 presentation was explicit on the matter, insisting that the generalization of “book credit” – scriptural money not regulated by the legislator and created without any reference to gold – caused great instability. He noted in this regard: “The metal standard, owing to the interposition of fiduciary currencies, has lost all stability” and specified that “while it does curb an extreme depreciation of the monetary unit, it is always at the cost of a disastrous crisis that causes trouble in the relations between creditors and debtors (Travaux 1939, p. 23)”.
III. Reasons for choosing the gold standard
Why was the choice finally made in favour of the gold standard? Did all economists conduct the same analysis or was it a minimum agreement? Those were the questions that framed the following developments. Regarding the most ardent supporters of the gold standard, we will study Rist’s thinking, more than Rueff’s, who really become their “spokesman” only after the Second World War.
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1. Rist and the French positivist and monetary nominalist school: a minimum agreement
Usually (Blanc 2000), the opposition between Rist, described as a metallist and Nogaro as a nominalist, is perceived as relating to an opposition regarding the main functions of money. Nomalists favour the functions of exchange and measuring instruments while metallists favour the value reserve function. If we examine the reasons why Rist emphasizes the value reserve function, it is also because monetary manipulations have greatly affected the annuitant French middle class. When in 1961 Chelpner (Travaux 1961, p.17) revisited the debates of the 1920s and 1930s, he stressed how much this problem had influenced French political decisions but in our opinion, beyond this reason, Rist first sought, as it were, what the essence of money was; this is apparent when he wrote:
What is important... to the economist is not so much to arrive at a good definition of money as to be familiar with and understand “monetary phenomena”; i.e. the way in which the various instruments, so varied and so numerous that reality offers to our observation and that we call money, behave in different circumstances (Rist 1938, p. 340).
Three French specialists in monetary issues, Aftalion, Nogaro and Simiand, who participated in the congress, are both nominalist in monetary terms and men whose methodology participates in the positivist school of economics. This is particularly clear with François Simiand, who wrote La méthode positive en économie in 1912, as well as with Nogaro in his book La méthode de l'économie politique (Marchal1950, p.327). This is also noticeable but to a lesser degree in Aftalion (Lhomme 1945, p.12). Finally, Nogaro thought so, seeing Aftalion, Simiand and himself as “the main representatives of the ‘French method’, which, as is easily understood, was strongly marked by positivism. Moreover, when in his thesis “Introduction à la philosophie de l’histoire” Aron attacks the positivist methodology, François Simiand is often cited as one of its most emblematic supporters (Measure 1986, p. vi).
Rist in his January-February 1938 Revue d’économie politique of Aftalion’s book “L’or et la monnaie. Leur valeur, les mouvements de l’or” bemoans his nominalism and accuses him of referring to money as if it were an exchange voucher. Moreover, while for Aftalion the monetary unit becomes over time more and more independent of metal and as if endowed
10 with a life of its own, Rist believes it is made up of monetary instruments (banknotes, cheques etc.) which only become “a reality if they are” attached “to an object having value by itself, namely gold, silver, etc. or to a legal title, i.e. cheque, banknote or paper money (Rist 1938, p. 224)”. In fact, reading Rist’s book “Histoire des doctrines relatives au credit et à la monnaie” shows that for this author, the essential thing is to distinguish between money and credit. It seems to think that money is close to what is called the central bank money or the monetary base. We can see this when he writes: it is the central banks that must hold gold, whereas in his presentation Nogaro insisted on the importance of gold being held by individuals.
Therefore, there is, as has just been seen, a profound opposition on the nature of money between Rist on the one hand and, on the other, Aftalion, Nogaro and Simiand. How then can “nominalists” accept to defend the gold standard just like Rist? On this point, Pirou’s account of Rist’s book “Histoire des doctrines relatives au crédit et à la monnaie (1938)” in the Revue d'économie politique seems to provide the key to this enigma. Pirou in his review accuses Rist of not unfairness in his treatment of other French currency specialists, namely François Simiand, Aftalion and Nogaro. He also reproached him with not understanding that paper money has been legal tender for so long that our view of it has changed as a result of a “phenomenon of collective psychology”. Moreover, in connection with Durkheim’s positivism, he complained that he does not carry out a neutral analysis but allows himself to be guided by what he considered to be the Good and to arrive at a “doctrine of the right and good currency”. Yet, in the end, he rallied the gold standard for political and moral reasons, and wrote:
Together with Mr. Rist, we tend to think that, by virtue of the discipline it imposes, and by curbing the free action of governments, gold-linked money should be preferred since the wisdom of public authorities is not to be trusted, and since it is deemed that the evils of unstable currency are more formidable than the convenience of a soft currency (Pirou 1938, p.306).
In fact, adherence to the gold standard seems dual in nature. Rist’s, and probably Rueff’s support of it (the latter took little part in the debates on the subject) is very profound and based on the idea that a certain essence of money does exist, even if we feel Rist is reluctant to go that far, whereas support by nominalists is much more circumstantiated.
2. The problem of the international standard
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Most delegates defend the gold standard for three additional reasons. First of all, they are for the most part in favour of economies open to international trade. On this point, gold seemed, when they met, the only truly realistic way to settle trade balances between nations. Admittedly, Jean Weiller (1905-2000), while insisting on the ideal of “economic internationalism”, somewhat criticized the “ancients” for relying too much on laissez-faire and seemed to support the creation of a set of flexible institutions to regulate the international monetary system (Travaux 1939, p. 154), but this is only a remark.
Moreover, Maurice Ansiaux’s report made it clear that they feared the emergence of a Keynesian-inspired global monetary system. In his report, the University of Brussels professor noted that new conceptualizations of the “monetary standard” deem that “the monetary balance of yore is regarded as a harmful superstition. It hinders the progress of business, causes or prolongs unemployment and disrupts international trade” so that it is important to replace “the tyrannical-standard with the servant-standard” (Travaux 1939, p. 13). In a way, therefore, they consider it necessary to return to the gold standard so as to restore a stable international order. On this point, they were heeded, at least partially, in Bretton Woods.
A third point is also worth mentioning: France’s place in the concert of nations. This concern seems to underlie Rist’s thinking when he declared in 1939:
“Basically, I think we all deluded ourselves during the 19th century... We all deluded ourselves about the international character of the gold standard. What has always dominated the markets is the London market (Travaux 1939, p. 45)”; and further on, “in reality, it was a magnificent principle that was intended to link all issuing banks to the Bank of England (Travaux 1939, p. 46)’.
The session chairman, Truchy (1864-1950), then intervened and replied: "Your thinking boils down to this: the only real international standard that has ever existed has been the national standard of a prominent nation (Travaux 1939, p. 47)”. We think we can conclude that even though the pound was somehow the de facto international currency, the gold standard allowed France (which nevertheless held a reasonable amount of gold) to be, or believe it was, an important player in the global financial and monetary game. It should also be noted that when Germain-Martin became Minister of Finance in December 1932, the French gold stock ended up with a record 4914 tonnes (Baudin 1952, p. 9). When these discussions were held in 1939, the research work that was to bring about the new monetary world order that emerged with the Bretton Woods agreements had already been launched and
12 a number of economists who were taking part in the Congress had clearly in mind the issue of France’s place in the community of nations.
Conclusion
French (and more generally French-speaking) economists fully understood the challenges the financial war effort – and the subsequent global financial turmoil as well as the generalization of the cashless currency – posed to the gold standard. Two camps emerged: one around the nominalists of the positivist school of economics (Aftalion, Nogaro, Simiand) and another one, the metallists, around Charles Rist. Nomalists believed that over time it would be possible to do without gold, but examples, elsewhere in the world, of countries such as Germany, which had broken this link, did not encourage them to jump the Rubicon immediately, especially since they thought only gold could act as an international standard. On this point too, France’s position weighed on their judgment. They understood that, if the monetary standard is to be a currency, it will be a greater power’s currency and that, in this case, France would find it difficult to prove influential in the community of nations. Moreover, the reference to gold made it possible to mitigate the use of money for the active economic policy purposes they feared. Rist and Rueff had a more purely monetary approach that, in a way, sought to answer a currently haunting question: What is the nature of money created through credit?
Bibliographie Aftalion, A., 1926, Les théories dominantes du change, Revue d’économie politique, vol 40 Aftalion, A., 1926, Théorie psychologique du change, Revue d’économie politique, vol 40 N°3. Aftalion, A., 1928, Compte rendu critique du livre de Rueff, Théorie des phénomènes monétaires, Revue d’économie politique, vol 42 N°1. Aftalion, A., 1930, L’histoire du change en France et la théorie psychologique du change, Revue d’économie politique, vol 44 N°2. Baudin, L., 1952, Notice sur la vie et les travaux de Louis Germain-Martin, Paris :Institut de France Blanc, J., 2007, Questions sur la nature de la monnaie :Charles Rist et Bertrand Nogaro, 1904- 1951 in P. Dockès, L. Frobert, G. Klotz, J_P ;, Potier, A. Tiran 2000, Éditions du CNRS, pp.259-270, 2000.
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De Boissieu C., 2002 « Présentation » in Rist, C., 2002 [1952] , Histoire des doctrines relatives au crédit et à la monnaie, Paris : Dalloz,. De Marchi, N., Dolhman, P. 1991, « League of Nations Economists and the Ideal of Peaceful Change in the Decade of the “Thirthies”” in Goodwin Craufurd D., 1991, Economics and National Security. Durham: Duke University Press. Freiertag, O., 2006, William Baumgartner, Paris : Comité pour l’histoire économique et financière de la France. Frobert, L., 2000, Le travail de François Simiand (1873-1935), Paris : Oeconomica. Garrigou-Lagrange, A., 1952, « La théorie monétaire de Bertrand Nogaro », in La monnaie, Paris : Éditions Domat Montchrestien. James, E., (ed), 1952, Analyse des théories de la monnaie, Paris : Éditions Domat Montchrestien. Lescure, J., 1933, « Prix, monnaie, et crédit » in Economic Essays in honour of Gustav Cassel, London :George Allen&Unwin LTD. Lhomme, J ., 1945, « La méthode des recherches chez Albert Aftalion », in L’œuvre scientifique d’Albert Aftalion, Paris :Editions Domat Montchrestien Lhomme, J., 1957, « L’influence intellectuelle d’Albert Aftalion », Revue économique, vol.8, N°3. Marchal, A., 1950, Bertrand Nogaro et le problème de la méthode, Revue d’économie politique. Vol 60 N°3. Mesure, S., 1986, « Note pour la présente édition », in Aron, R., 1986, Introduction à la philosophie de l’histoire, Paris :tel gallimard Meynial, P., 1925, « The French Debt Problem » et le déséquilibre du budget, Revue d’économie politique, Juillet-Août 1925. Mouly, J., 1952, « La théorie monétaire d’Albert Aftalion », in La monnaie, Paris : Éditions Domat Montchrestien. Nogaro, B, 1906, Contribution à une théorie réaliste de la monnaie, Revue d’économie politique vol XX. Nogaro, B., 1935, La monnaie et les phénomènes monétaires contemporains, Paris : Librairie générale de droit et de jurisprudence. Nogaro, B., 1940, L’étalon d’or a-t-il existé ? Revue d’économie politique, Mars –Avril 1940, N°2. Perez Y.A, 2012, La crise des années trente dans le regard des économistes français : ses causes, ses conséquences et ses remèdes possibles in « Humanisme et entreprise 2012/2 n°307 (https://www.cairn.info/revue-humanisme-et-entreprise-2012-2-page- 1.htm) Pirou, G., 1938, « La monnaie dans le passé et le présent » Revue d’économie politique, vol 52 n°2. Pirou, G., 1946, Introduction à l’étude de l’économie politique, Paris :Recueil Sirey Rist, C., 1927, Compte rendu critique du livre d’Aftalion : Monnaie prix et change, Revue d’économie politique, vol 41 N°2. Rist, C., 1932, « Le mécanisme de l’étalon-or a-t-il été faussé ? », Revue d’économie politique, vol. 46, n°2. Rist, C., 1938, « Compte rendu du livre d’Albert Aftalion. L’or et la monnaie. Leur valeur, les mouvements de l’or » in Revue d’économie politique, vol 52 n°1. Rist, C., 2002 [1952] , Histoire des doctrines relatives au crédit et à la monnaie, Paris: Dalloz. Simiand, F., 1923-1924, Nogaro (Bertrand) La monnaie et les phénomènes monétaires contemporains, Paris, Giard, L’Année sociologique 1923-1924, p.766-769. Simiand, F., 1934, « La monnaie réalité sociale », Annales Sociologiques, Série D, fasc.1. p.1- 86. 14
Travaux du congrès des économistes de langue française, 1933, Économie libérale et économie dirigée ; L’étalon or, Paris : Domat-Montchrestien. Travaux du congrès des économistes de langue française, 1935, Évolution du crédit et contrôle des banques ; La réforme économique aux États-Unis, Paris : Domat- Montchrestien. Travaux du congrès des économistes de langue française, 1937, Étude comparée du capitalisme et du bolchevisme ; La stabilisation monétaire est-elle souhaitable, est- elle Travaux du congrès des économistes de langue française, 1939, Comment se pose actuellement la question des étalons de valeur ; Les fonds d’égalisation des changes et leur action sur les prix et sur l’activité économique, Paris : Domat-Montchrestien. Travaux du congrès des économistes de langue française, 1961, Monnaie et expansion, Paris : Éditions Cujas.
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Appendix 1
An Mois Ville Thèmes des congrès et participants 1 1926 février Paris La stabilisation monétaire ( C,1950, p.42) 2 1927 28 février au 1er Paris Les théories monétaires envisagées à la lumière des expériences récentes mars (REP 1927, XLI, p.192) 3 1928 20 et 21 février Paris Les discussions ont porté sur : (REP 1928 p.213) • La politique du crédit en vue de remédier au chômage ; • Les bilans après le retour à l’or ; • Les mouvements des prix après la stabilisation ; • L’utilité et la possibilité de la création d’une unité monétaire internationale. • Participants : Aftalion (Paris), Ansiaux (Bruxelles), Baudhuin (Louvain), Bayart (Lille), Beaucourt (Stasbourg), Chlepner (Bruxelles), De Briey (Angers), de Lannoy (Gand), Jèze (Paris), Max Lazar (Paris), Lescure (Paris), Mahaim (Liège), Marion (Paris), Le Pelletier (Paris), Mounier (Bordeaux), Noyelle (Caen), Oualid (Paris), Barthelemy Reynaud (Aix), Simiand (Paris), Truchy (Paris) : Vanlaër (Lille). Secrétaires de séances : Hugon, H. Germain-Martin, Lhomme, Saint Genès. 4 1929 Paris inconnu 5 1930 Paris inconnu 6 1931 Paris inconnu 7 1932 Paris inconnu 8 1933 Paris Deux thèmes : (premier compte-rendu imprimé) • Économie libérale et économie dirigée rapporteur De Leener (Bruxelles). • L’étalon or, rapporteur Nogaro (Paris) • Participants : Aftalion, Allix, Ansiaux, Chelpner, Baudhuin, Beaucourt, Byé, Brun (Lucien), Divisia, Duval-Arnould, Fromont, Gemähling, Gouze, Harsin, Hornbostel, Landry, De Lannoy, Laufenburger, Lavergne, Lazard (Max), Lecarpentier, Leduc, Lepelletier, Marion, Maunier Noyelle, Oualid, Perreau, Perroux, Pirou, Picard (Roger), Rappard, Rist, Rueff, Saint-Germés, Simiand, Truchy 9 1934 Paris Deux thèmes : • La place rationnelle des syndicats dans les sociétés modernes rapporteur De Brouckère ( (Bruxelles). • La réforme des systèmes fiscaux, rapporteur Laufenburger (Strasbourg). Participants : Allix (Paris), Aucuy (Paris), Baudhuin (Louvain), Beaucourt (Strasbourg), Blondel (Paris), De Brouckère (Bruxelles)), Claoué (Paris), Colson (Paris), Courtin (Montpelllier), Divisia (Paris), Duval-Arnould (Paris), Dolléans (Edouard) (Dijon), Gemähling (Strasbourg), Gouze (Angers), Harsin (Liège), Hornbostel (Poitier), Landry (Paris), Lazard (Max) (Paris), Laufenburger (Strasbourg), Lavergne (Lille), Lecarpentier (Paris), De Leener (Bruxelles), Leduc (Caen), Lepelletier (Paris), Lemoine (Bruxelles), Lescure (Paris), Maunier (Paris), Noyelle (Caen), Oualid W. (Paris), Perreau (Paris), Pirou (Paris), Rappard (Bruxelles), Risier G.(Paris), Rueff (Paris), Saint- Germé (Strasnourg), Simiand (Paris), Truchy (Paris).
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10 1935 4 et 5 mars Paris Deux thèmes • Évolution des crédits et contrôle des banques rapporteur Ansiaux (Bruxelles). • La réforme économique aux USA, rapporteur Oualid (Paris). Participants : Allix, Arnou (Père) (Lille), Ansiaux, Aucuy, Baudhuin, Bye (Toulouse), Claoué(Paris) Colson, Courtin, , De Broukère, De Lannoy (Gand), De Leerner, Divisia, Duprie (Louvain), Duval-Arnould, (Edouard), Fromont (Rennes), Gouze, Harsin, Herbette (Paris), Landry, Laufenburger, Lavergne, Lazard (Max), Lecarpentier, Leduc, Lepelletier (Paris), Lescure, Lucien Brun (Lyon), Mahaim (Liègre, Marchal (André) (Dijon), Marchal (Jean) (Nancy), Maunier (Paris), Mounier (Bordeaux), Mourre (Paris), Miry (Gand), Nogaro (Paris), Oualid (W.), Pirou, Rappard, Risler (G.), Rist (Paris) Saint-Germés, Simiand, Truchy. 11 1936 Paris Deux thèmes : • L’autarcie, rapporteur Landry (Paris). • La corporation devant la doctrine et devant les faits, rapporteur De Leener (Bruxelles). Participants : Arnou (Père) (Lille), Ansiaux, Aucuy, Baudhuin, Baudin, Beaucourt, Blondel, Boissard (Lille), Brun, Byé, Castrillo (Italie), Colson, Cornelissen (Pays-Bas) , Courtin, De Broukère, De Lannoy, De Waha (Louvain), Divisia, Fromont, Gemähling, Gouze, Harsin (Liège), Hornbostel, Janssen (Bruxelles), Laufenburger, Laurent Dechesne, Lavergne, Lazard (Max), Lecarpentier, Lescure, Maunier, Moncharville (Strasbourg), Nogaro, Oualid, Pinto, Pirou, Rappard, Risler, Roger (Louvain), Rueff, Saint-Germés, Steels (Bruxelles), Truchy. 12 1937 Paris Deux thèmes : • Étude comparée du capitalisme et du bolchevisme). Rapporteur Lescure (Paris). • La stabilisation monétaire est-elle souhaitable, est-elle possible ? Rapporteur Dechesne (Liège). Participants : Aftalion, Allix, Aucuy, Baudhuin, Baudin, Beaucourt, Blondel, Bouglé (Paris), Courtin, Dechesne, Divisia, Dolléans, Germain-Martin (ancien ministre), Gouze, Harsin, Heilperin (Genève), Hornbostel, Jeanneney (Dijon), Jèze (Paris), Landry, Laufenburger, Lavergne, Lazard, Lecarpentier, Leduc, Lescure, Lhomme (Lille), Lucien Brun (Dijon), Mahaim (Liège), Marion (Paris), Maunier, Nogaro, Oualid, Perroux, Picard, Piettre, Pirou, Rappard, Risler, Rist, Saint-Germés, Trévoux (Grenoble), Weiller. (Poitiers) 13 1938 Paris Deux thèmes : • Quelques aspects de la reprise allemande : méthode et résultats, rapporteur Laufenburger (Strasbourg). • Hausse des prix et réorganisation des entreprises, rapporteur Baudhuin (Louvain). Participants : Aftalion, Allix, Ansiaux, R-P.Arnou, Aucuy, Baudhuin, Baudin, Blondel, Byé, Courtin, Dechesne, Delannoy, Divisia, Dupriez, Garrigou-Lagrange, Gemähling, Gouze, Heilperin, Jèze, Lasserre, Lavergne, Laufenburger, Lecarpentier, Leduc, De Leener, Lemoine, Lescure, Lhomme, Lucien Brun, Mahaim, Maunier, De Menthon, Nogaro, Oualid, Piettre (Strasbourg) , Pirou, Rappard, Risler, Rist, Saint-Germés, Trévoux, Weiller. 14 1939 Paris Deux thèmes : • Comment se pose actuellement la question des étalons de valeur, rapporteur Ansiaux (Bruxelles). • Les fonds d’égalisation des changes et leur action sur les prix et sur l’activité économique, rapporteur Rist (Paris). Participants : Aftalion, Ansiaux, R-P.Arnon, Aucuy, Baudhuin, Beaucourt, Belin (Pars) Blondel Georges, Byé, Chlepner, Courtin, Da Silva (Lisbonne), Dechesne (Liège), Duval-Arnould, Fromont, Garrigou-Lagrange, Gemähling, Gouze, Guitton, Hamel, Herbette, Jèze, Lavergne, Laufenburger, , Lazard (Max), Lecarpentier, De Leener, Lescure, Lhomme, Lucien-Brun, Maunier, De Menthon (Nancy), Nogaro, Oualid (W.), Picard, Piettre (Strabourg), Pirou, Rappard, Risler, Rist, Rougier (Besançon) Rousseaux, Rueff, Saitsef Zürich), Saint-Germés, Salleron (Paris), Trévoux, Truchy, Tudez, Vigreux (Bordeaux)
17
Villey (Caen), Weiller.
Sources : Travaux 1933 à 1939
18
Schéma 1
Instauration étalon-or 1870 Thèmes des travaux des économistes de langue française o 1 en lien avec la problématique monétaire
Août : décrochage du franc de l’or 1914
1922 Accords de Gênes
La livre revient convertible en or en 1925 mai 1926 Premier travaux du congrès : thème stabilisation monétaire. Gaston Jèze et Charles Rist , deux hommes qui deviendront des habitués des congrès 1927 nommé au comité des experts chargé de la stabilisation du franc Le franc revient convertible en or Théories monétaires 1928 Les bilans après le retour à l’or, l’utilité et la possibilité de la création d’une unité monétaire internationale Krack de Wall Street 1929
1930
Dévaluation de la livre sterling et 1931 décrochage de l’or 1932
Conférence de Londres : les USA 1933 Rapport de Nogaro sur l’étalon-or décrochent de l’or et création du bloc de l’or 1934
La Belgique dévalue. Rôle important 1935 Rapport d’Ansiaux : Evolution des crédits et contrôle des banques joué par un participant aux Travaux : Baudhuin. 1936 La France, la Hollande et la Suisse dévaluent 1937 Rapport de Dechesne : La stabilisalisation monétaire est-elle possible, est- elle souhaitable ? 1938
1939 Rapport d’Ansiaux : La question des étalons de valeur ; Rapport de Rist :les fonds d’égalisation des changes
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