Despite the fact that the second half of the twentieth century was a time when the discipline of economics largely turned it back on its own history, there is a pleasant irony that it was also a time that produced several top scholars in the field. There may have been no time in the modern history of the discipline when so many excellent people toiled in our vineyards. It was also a time when many journals in the field where started, and thrived.
One of the people who helped to define this recent “golden age” in the history of economics was Gilles Dostaler, who died earlier this year on 26 February after a courageous battle with cancer.
Gilles's work had many hallmarks. One of the most obvious of these was that he wrote about some of the most prominent figures in the modern history of the discipline, Keynes, Hayek, and Friedman, as well as one of the most prominent of the nineteenth century, Marx. Gilles was well read not only in economics, however, but also in history, philosophy, and psychology. He also had training in mathematics. Thus, he was able to deal with the works of the great theorists on whom he worked at many levels: the theoretical, the political, the philosophical, and cultural.
Thus, a second hallmark of Gilles's work was the rich contextual background that he provided in his writing. He could explain both the mathematical surface of an economic theory, as well as the deeper questions that animated the theorist's work. Gilles was equally at ease elucidating the political dimensions of economic theory as he was the philosophical. An excellent example of Gilles's approach is in one of his last books, Keynes et ses combats, first published in Paris in 2005 (translated into English as Keynes and His Battles in 2007). The book not only lays out Keynes's evolution as an economic theorist, it includes full treatments of all the many cultural, political, and philosophical currents that defined Keynes's life. There are chapters, for instance, on how the wars during Keynes's life affected him, how the changing landscape of British politics shaped his thinking, and how his involvement in Bloomsbury affected him. As the title of the book suggests, Gilles believed that economists were shaped by the battles in which they were engaged.
The success of Keynes et ses combats points to another hallmark of his work: he was an excellent writer, who knew how to construct a compelling historical narrative. His skills as a writer made his work in great demand; his sixteen books were translated into at least seven different languages. Keynes and His Battles was particularly popular in Japan where it was reviewed in all the top national newspapers and sold in numbers rarely achieved by a book in the history of economic thought. The book was also a finalist for the Governor General's Award, one of the top prizes in Canadian literature.
Gilles will be most remembered for his books, but he was also a prolific author of peer-reviewed journal articles and chapters in edited volumes. One of Gilles's special roles within the profession was the service he provided on the editorial boards of journals. This service was all the more important because he served on the boards of journals published in both English and French.
Those who knew Gilles only through his work on the giants of twentieth century economics will, perhaps, be surprised to discover that he wrote his dissertation (at Paris 8) on Marx and the theory of value. Near the end of his life, he decided to re-issue a revised version of Valeur et prix: histoire d'un débat, one of the two books which came from his dissertation. What will not surprise anyone who knew Gilles's work well, the book is a subtle analytical treatment of the debates surrounding the theory of value. Although he had strong political allegiances, Gilles's work was never characterized by polemics or naïve advocacy. He was as likely to find the similarities between Keynes and Friedman, for instance, or Hayek and Marx, as he was to demonstrate their differences. His purpose was more to show the way that debates within the profession worked than it was to identify the “winners” and “losers”.
At the time of his death, Gilles had been a professor of economics at the University of Quebec at Montreal for thirty two years. He had started at UQAM as a professor of sociology in1975, and then moved to economics four years later. Gilles was an active participant in the community of historians of economic thought in France, where he was active in two research centers: LEREPS Toulouse and PHARE at Paris 1. He was the ideal reflection of the growing international nature of the discipline over the last twenty years, active on three continents and well respected everywhere.
Gilles will be missed by everyone who worked with him and knew him as a friend.