L'excès et les contraintes alimentaires vus à travers la pensée économique européenne (XVIe - XIXe siècles)

"The question of food excess and, at the opposite end of the spectrum, of food shortages, has historically provided, on a macro-economic level, an ideological battleground for a great number of economists. During the 16th and 17th centuries, the main questions were couched in terms of the surpluses and reserves necessary to stave off agricultural penury, whether in the present or in a more distant future. How could one bring them to light and, above all, how could they be managed ? Various nations put into practice their recommendations, often instituting (self-sustaining) protectionist and interventionist policies to create surpluses. On the contrary, during the 18th and 19 th centuries, attempts were made to attain a permanent balance between excess and want, to the degree that the imbalance between population and resources began to decline. Food excesses and constraints were analysed, on a macroeconomic scale, in much the same way as excesses and constraints relating to the human body, for the economists had established an analogy between the nourishment of the body and the provisioning of the nation. These analogies are particularly frequent in cases where the economists had also practised as doctors."