The French economist Marie Esprit Léon Walras (1834-1910) influenced modern economic theory by his discovery of the general equilibrium theory, which was designed to include within a single logically coherent model the theories of exchange, production, capital, and money.

Léon Walras was born in Évreux in Normandy, son of the economist Auguste Walras, who was forced by the low esteem in which economics was held in France in his day to waste his talents in the performance of administrative functions within the French centralized system of education. Auguste vowed to realize his cherished ambition to renovate economics and place it on a firm scientific basis through his son. This is precisely what Léon eventually did.

Career as an Economist

Léon's initiation in economics was late, hesitant, and singularly unpropitious. He was self-taught, having had no one but his father...