‘LUXURY BEYOND MORALS’: THE RISE AND TRANSFORMATION OF THE CONCEPT IN EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY RUSSIA

Elena Korchmina and Mikhail Kiselev

Journal of the History of Economic Thought, 2022, vol. 44, issue 3, 437-455

Abstract: Luxury has always been an intrinsic part of world history, but the words “luxe” or “luxury” in the conventional sense are quite new, entering the French and English languages only in the seventeenth century. It was only at the end of the seventeenth century that the core of this phenomenon came up for discussion in Europe against a backdrop of development of international trade and incipient economic growth. During these debates, the concept of luxury was gradually demoralized by economic liberalism. Translations played a seminal role in the defining of the concept of luxury. European thinkers coordinated their positions even if they disagreed with each other. How was the notion of luxury conceptualized outside the European Roman world? Russia is an interesting example that helps to understand it. The article answers when and why the concept of luxury entered Russian political thought and why luxury, although finding itself outside the bounds of morality, continued to be only condemned in the economic sphere.

Date: 2022
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