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Annette Weiner used the term 'inalienable possessions' to describe a category of property of fundamental importance in Oceania, and in Europe, from Roman times until the eighteenth century. The archetypal form of this inalienable wealth is the landed estate - the 'immovable property' of Romano-Germanic law. This type of wealth, inherently political and carrying functions we associate with the state, has been historically produced by aristocratic social orders. I argue that classical anthropology missed the opportunity to explore aristocracy as a comparative analytical category. A reexamination of classic ethnographies reveals the importance of both aristocracy and this inalienable power-wealth, even in iconic accounts of 'egalitarian society' such as Evans-Pritchard's study of the Nuer. Further consideration of inalienable property shows it to be central to the early-modern state (Commonwealth) just as it was to the Roman republic (Res Publica), and suggests the possibility of a productive new comparative frame of analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The process of institutionalisation of political economy has become of increasing interest in tracing the evolution of economic thought. This paper presents a comparison of the development of these processes in Italy and Spain, through the analysis of the presence of political economy in some institutions in both countries between 1860 and 1900: universities, economic associations, economic journals and national parliaments. This essay aims at supplying new insights to the consolidation of economics as a scientific and socially appreciated field of knowledge, and exploring the influence of the form of institutionalisation on the economic ideas diffused in a particular country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]