Abstract
Autore:
Parisi Daniela
Titolo:
" Una lunga vita da economista. L´itinerario biografico e scientifico di Jenny Kretschmann Griziotti (1884-1980)"
The article deals with Jenny Griziotti Kretschmann, born in Wishni-Wolostchok ( Russia ) on 22 June 1884 in a middleclass family of German origin and died on 4 December 1980 in Pavia ( Italy ). In October 1905 she moved from Moscow to Lausanne in order to enroll at the Faculty of Social Sciences where she attended Vilfredo Pareto’s courses in Economics. Here she met Benvenuto Griziotti, also in Lausanne for a postgraduate specializing course; in Pavia he would become one of the major Italian scholars in Finance. In 1908 she followed him to Rome where she enrolled at the Faculty of Law, and attended courses held by Antonio De Viti De Marco, Rodolfo Benini and Maffeo Pantaloni, who was carrying out innovative analysis on system dynamics factors. Under Pantaleoni’s supervision, she got her full degree in December 1912. From 1930 until her retirement in 1954 she taught as a Lecturer in Economics at the University of Pavia (1930-1933), was assigned the course of Financial Law and Finance at the University of Parma (1935-1940) and of History of Economic Doctrines at the University of Pavia (1940-1954); since 1948 she was also assigned the course of Finance and Economic Policy. She never had the possibility to hold any academic chair; those who knew her acknowledged that her political creed and her status as an academic’s wife did not favour her career at all.Some prevailing paths of interest can be discerned in her numerous articles, essays and monographs on issues in Economy and Economic Theory. Initially (1915-1929) she carried out pioneer systematic analysis of the peculiar features of Russian economy. Another area of interest of hers was the analysis of long-term price movements. A third research area she addressed included issues in economic and financial policies, and a fourth area of interest was the history of economic thought, in which regard her handbook is of primary importance; it is based on an interdisciplinary approach, as systems can be fully understood only if analyzed in the context of the social and ideological milieus in which they constitute and evolve in time. Part of her fecund activity is reflected in textbooks on economic policy and finance (1950-1954) and her commitment, also to the diffusion of economic thought, is testified by her translations into Italian of works by Wagemann (1932), Wicksell, von Mises and Hayek (1935) and the fifth Italian edition of Economics by P. Samuelson (1964). Partly inventoried biographical material and the collection of her writings are available in the Griziotti Family Archive in Pavia ( Italy ). The most significant recognition of her status has only recently been awarded by those few - not Italian - authors who came in contact with her scientific work
