Marchés des produits de luxe et division internationale du travail (XIXe–XXe siècles)

Cet article aborde la question des changements, dans la très longue durée, de la division internationale du travail à partir d'un observatoire qui est l'échange de produits de luxe. Cette approche est loin d'être mineure, car le commerce international s'est structuré, à l'époque moderne, à partir de ces produits de prix élevé. Dans la première moité du XIX^e siècle, les trois évolutions les plus importantes ont été la régression structurelle des exportations de l'Asie des produits de haute qualité vers les produits primaires, la situation d'exportateur primaire des états-Unis et la division du travail entre Grande-Bretagne et France, entre exportations de produits industriels de qualité moyenne et exportations de produits de luxe et demi-luxe. Cette division internationale du travail marque encore fortement les échanges du XX^e siècle. Au travers de cette étude sont recherchés les déterminants de la division internationale du travail, qui ne se comprend guère avec l'analyse économique standard d'inspiration ricardienne ou néoclassique. Des raisons complexes—provenant de la structure sociale des marchés des pays exportateurs, de leurs traditions de savoir-faire, des pratiques et des circuits commerciaux, des usages de paiement et de la structure des circuits des compensations internationales—expliquent que les actions individuelles des agents économiques convergent vers des configurations macroéconomiques qui ont leurs logiques propres.     

Les objets de la chose théorie du hasard et surréalisme au xxe siècle

On the basis of the trajectory of something made of paster which had impassioned the statisticians of the years 1880 and which furnished André Breton the very exemple for the notion of a surrealist object, one wonders whether the surrealist theory of chance was born by chance. By translating the issue which Ernest Coumet addressed in 1970 concerning the Pascalian geometry of chance, we investigate here the relationship between the history of science, art history and the history of scientific culture during the last century. In return, we hope to suggest why Coumet's article opened such a wide horizon in the history of the theory of probabilities thirty years ago.     

Machiavélisme et Staats-Raison au XVIIIe siècle d’après L’Universal-Lexikon de Zedler

This article examines the manner in which the Grosses vollständiges Universal-Lexikon published by Johann Heinrich Zedler from 1732 to 1750 and considered as the most important german language encyclopedia of its time, welcomes and restructures the classical doctrine of the reason of State. Contrary to the interpretation in which the concept of the State developed by the Lexikon would fit into a pure jusnaturalistic logic, it shows the permanence, parallel to wolffian natural law, of a prudential tradition of political thought. The Lexikon, a contemporary of the Anti-Machiavel of Frederic II, thus appears to be the faithful mirror of the heterogeneous tendencies which then illustrate the field of the problems in the reason of State.     

Le crépuscule des Dieux: Regards sur le polythéisme hindou et l'athéisme bouddhique (XVIIe‐XIXe siècle)

From the Age of Classicism to the Age of the Enlightenment. Indian heathendom (that is to say, Hinduism as it was perceived in those times) provided Europe with the spectacle of an incomparable profusion of polytheism. But if India appeared as the living sanctuary of countless divinities, it had also been the cradle of Buddhism which disappeared from its native land to spread over an immense part of Asia. Buddhism was conceived of as an “absolute atheism”; whose fundamental doctrine — the famous nirvana — was considered to be a form of nihilism which had no equivalent in the history of the human mind. Thus, the historiographical discourse on religious matters in India fits into a triad‐like structure in which atheism plays a pivotal role between monotheism and polytheism. A long time after the scholarly discovery of Hinduism and Buddhism, the archaic aspect of this discourse constantly reveals itself in the residual nature of the myth of the double doctrine and the persistence of the theme of the Monster. For philologists and historians of religions until the beginning of the twentieth century, Indian excesses in the religious domain continue to constitute a violation of Reason and Nature.     

«Une mission glorieuse et profitable» réforme missionnaire et économie sucrière dans la province jésuite du Brésil au début du XVIIe siècle

At the beginning of the seventeenth century, the Jesuit province of Brazil is affected by tensions which reveal the complexity of its relation both with the colonial society and with the Roman center of the order. The paper is focused on an exceptional and original document about which nothing is clearly identified (author, date), theAdvertências para a província do Brasil. It allows a precise analysis of the missionary enterprise, as an economico-political experience (the Jesuits become one of the most important sugar producers of the country), and as a spiritual experience (through the salvation of the missionaries and the conversion of the Indians). This document is centered on thealdeia which is described as the main structure for the action of the Jesuits in Brazil. In that way, it reveals a global vision of the mission, geopolitical, economical and religious, which has systematically been overshadowed by the traditional historiography, whose approach of the missionary phenomenon was exclusively spiritual.     

La position de la France dans l'industrie européenne des machines à vapeur durant la seconde moitié du XIXe siècle∗

At least from the standpoint of the steam‐engine industry, the nature of industrial relations between France and other countries underwent a significant change during the half century which elapsed between 1860 and 1910. Towards 1860, the major characteristics are dispersion and nationalism; on the other hand, at the beginning of the twentieth century, while there is a new concentration on the national level, it confronts a distinct cosmopolitanism on the international level. To give an idea of this evolution, we will refer to two French works on steam‐engines, dated 1861–62 and 1913 respectively. They are of an essential practical nature and describe a large number of engines which were actually available on the market. Below, we will successively examine the early manufacturers existing through 1861–62, then those dating from 1913 only, and finally the establishments which have endured throughout the whole period under consideration. This study aims at pointing out the clear decadence of the French industry which became increasingly dependent upon foreign sources in the areas of technical creativeness as well as production.