The Economic Thought in the Counter-Reformation Age: Giovanni Botero and Antonio Serra

Abstract

Although the centrality of the works of Giovanni Botero in the political literature of the first half of the seventeenth century is widely recognized, the role that the former Jesuit had in the economic thought of the Catholic Counter-Reformation has not yet been sufficiently analyzed. In fact, Botero’s works reveal that the existence of a mentality favorable to the development of productive and commercial activities was present and widespread even in the post-Tridentine period. In particular the theses expressed in Antonio Serra’s Breve trattato reveals clear affinity with Botero’s thought and in the same period in Spain the literature focused on similar themes in an attempt to counteract the decadence of the Iberian society. This article shows that the analyses by Botero and Serra are complementary and fully consistent with the spirit of the Counter-Reformation, offering a different historiographical perspective on the relations between Catholicism and the genesis of capitalist economy.