Gottlieb Hufeland (29 October 1760 – 25 February 1817) was a German

economist An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social sciences, social science discipline of economics. The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this ...

and

jurist A jurist is a person with expert knowledge of law; someone who analyses and comments on law. This person is usually a specialist legal scholar, mostly (but not always) with a formal qualification in law and often a legal practitioner. In the Uni ...

Biography

Born in Danzig (Gdańsk),

Royal Prussia Royal Prussia ( pl, Prusy Królewskie; german: Königlich-Preußen or , csb, Królewsczé Prësë) or Polish PrussiaAnton Friedrich Büsching, Patrick Murdoch. ''A New System of Geography'', London 1762p. 588/ref> (Polish: ; German: ) was a ...

Crown of Poland The Crown of the Kingdom of Poland ( pl, Korona Królestwa Polskiego; Latin: ''Corona Regni Poloniae''), known also as the Polish Crown, is the common name for the historic Late Middle Ages territorial possessions of the King of Poland, includ ...

, Hufeland was educated at the gymnasium of his native town, and completed his university studies at

Leipzig Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as wel ...

and

Göttingen Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a college town, university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the Capital (political), capital of Göttingen (district), the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, t ...

. He graduated at

Jena Jena () is a German city and the second largest city in Thuringia. Together with the nearby cities of Erfurt and Weimar, it forms the central metropolitan area of Thuringia with approximately 500,000 inhabitants, while the city itself has a popu ...

, and in 1788 was there appointed to an extraordinary professorship. Five years later he was made ordinary professor. His lectures on

natural law Natural law ( la, ius naturale, ''lex naturalis'') is a system of law based on a close observation of human nature, and based on values intrinsic to human nature that can be deduced and applied independently of positive law (the express enacte ...

, in which he developed with great acuteness and skill the formal principles of the

Kantian Kantianism is the philosophy of Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher born in Königsberg, Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia). The term ''Kantianism'' or ''Kantian'' is sometimes also used to describe contemporary positions in philosophy of mind, ...

theory of legislation, attracted a large audience, and contributed to raise to its height the fame of the University of Jena, then unusually rich in able teachers. In 1803, after the departure of many of his colleagues from Jena, Hufeland accepted a call to

Würzburg Würzburg (; Main-Franconian: ) is a city in the region of Franconia in the north of the German state of Bavaria. Würzburg is the administrative seat of the ''Regierungsbezirk'' Lower Franconia. It spans the banks of the Main River. Würzburg is ...

, from which, after but a brief tenure of a professorial chair, he proceeded to

Landshut Landshut (; bar, Landshuad) is a town in Bavaria in the south-east of Germany. Situated on the banks of the River Isar, Landshut is the capital of Lower Bavaria, one of the seven administrative regions of the Free State of Bavaria. It is also t ...

. From 1806 to 1812 he acted as

burgomaster Burgomaster (alternatively spelled burgermeister, literally "master of the town, master of the borough, master of the fortress, master of the citizens") is the English form of various terms in or derived from Germanic languages for the chief m ...

in his native town of Danzig. Returning to Landshut, he lived there until 1816, when he was invited to the

University of Halle Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg (german: Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg), also referred to as MLU, is a public, research-oriented university in the cities of Halle and Wittenberg and the largest and oldest university i ...

. In

political economy Political economy is the study of how Macroeconomics, economic systems (e.g. Marketplace, markets and Economy, national economies) and Politics, political systems (e.g. law, Institution, institutions, government) are linked. Widely studied ph ...

Hufeland's chief work is the ''Neue Grundlegung der Staatswirthschaftskunst'' (2 vols, 1807 and 1813), the second volume of which has the special title, ''Lehre vom Gelde und Geldumlaufe''. The principles of this work are for the most part those of

Adam Smith Adam Smith (baptized 1723 – 17 July 1790) was a Scottish economist and philosopher who was a pioneer in the thinking of political economy and key figure during the Scottish Enlightenment. Seen by some as "The Father of Economics"——— ...

's ''

Wealth of Nations ''An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations'', generally referred to by its shortened title ''The Wealth of Nations'', is the ''magnum opus'' of the Scottish economist and moral philosopher Adam Smith. First published in 1 ...

'', which were then beginning to be accepted and developed in Germany; but both in his treatment of fundamental notions, such as

economic good In economics, goods are items that satisfy human wants and provide utility, for example, to a consumer making a purchase of a satisfying product. A common distinction is made between goods which are transferable, and services, which are not tran ...

and

value Value or values may refer to: Ethics and social * Value (ethics) wherein said concept may be construed as treating actions themselves as abstract objects, associating value to them ** Values (Western philosophy) expands the notion of value beyo ...

, and in details, such as the

theory of money Monetary economics is the branch of economics that studies the different competing theories of money: it provides a framework for analyzing money and considers its functions (such as medium of exchange, store of value and unit of account), and ...

, Hufeland's treatment has a certain originality. Two points in particular seem deserving of notice. Hufeland was the first among German economists to point out the profit of the ''

entrepreneur Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values th ...

'' as a distinct species of revenue with laws peculiar to itself. He also tends towards, though he does not explicitly state the view that

rent Rent may refer to: Economics *Renting, an agreement where a payment is made for the temporary use of a good, service or property *Economic rent, any payment in excess of the cost of production *Rent-seeking, attempting to increase one's share of e ...

is a general term applicable to all payments resulting from differences of degree among productive forces of the same order. Thus the superior gain of a specially gifted workman or specially skilled employer is in time assimilated to the payment for a natural agency of more than the minimum efficiency. Hufeland died in 1817 in

Halle an der Saale Halle (Saale), or simply Halle (; from the 15th to the 17th century: ''Hall in Sachsen''; until the beginning of the 20th century: ''Halle an der Saale'' ; from 1965 to 1995: ''Halle/Saale'') is the largest city of the German state of Saxony-Anh ...

Works

Hufeland's works on the theory of legislation: *''Versuch über den Grundsatz Naturrechts'' (1785) *''Lehrbuch des Naturrechts'' (1790) *''Institutionen des gesammten positiven Rechts'' (1798) *''Lehrbuch der Geschichte und Encyclopadie alter in Deutschland geltenden positiven Rechte'' (1790) They are distinguished by precision of statement and clearness of deduction.

References

* Wilhelm Roscher, ''Geschichte der National-Ökonomik in Deutschland'', 1874, pp. 654–662. * {{DEFAULTSORT:Hufeland, Gottlieb 1760 births 1817 deaths German economists German jurists Writers from Gdańsk People from Royal Prussia Leipzig University alumni University of Göttingen alumni University of Jena alumni Academic staff of the University of Jena Academic staff of the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg Mayors of Gdańsk