In order to stabilize the tumbling financial markets and maintain the liquidity of companies and states, central banks around the world responded to the Covid-19 pandemic by increasing the money supply. The public discussion about these fiscal and monetary decisions, from their sufficiency to their potential for triggering future inflation, are dominated by economists. The advice of political philosophers, meanwhile, especially those from centuries ago, is not particularly sought after.
Yet this was not always the case. From antiquity until well into the 19th century, European and North American political philosophy revolved around questions of state financing, debt, property, and money. In other words, the relationship between economics and politics was at the heart of the theoretical debate. As such, it was also central for Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who wrote the entry " Économie politique" for Diderot's and d'Alembert's Encyclopédie, corresponded with the Physiocrats, and had none other than Adam Smith attentively review parts of his discourse on inequality.