"This thought-provoking monograph connects the idea of civil economy in Italian economic thought to the work of Thomas Aquinas. Its main thesis is that there is an alternative spirit of capitalism, with Catholic origins, and which has been carried through to the modern day via the Neapolitan...

Adam Smith characterized the medieval Roman Catholic Church as a force impeding Europe’s process of development. The Church was, in Smith words, “the most formidable combination that ever was formed against the authority and security of civil government, as well as against the liberty,...

The establishment of Christianity in the late- and post-Roman world caused an economic as well as a religious revolution, but, while a great deal of attention has been paid to the religious developments of the period, the impact of the establishment of the Church on the economy has attracted...