Lujo Brentano (18 December 1844–9 September 1931) was an eminent German economist and social reformer.

Lujo Brentano, born in Aschaffenburg into one of the most distinguished German-Catholic intellectual families (originally of Italian descent), attended school in Augsburg and Aschaffenburg. He studied in Dublin (Trinity College), Münster, Munich, Heidelberg (doctorate in law), Würzburg, Göttingen (doctorate in economics), and Berlin (habilitation in economics, 1871). He was a professor of economics and state sciences at the universities of Breslau, Strassburg, Vienna, Leipzig, and most importantly, Munich (1891–1914). During the short-lived Bavarian Socialist Republic led by Kurt Eisner (November 1917–February 1919), he served for some days in December 1918 as People's Commissar (Minister) for Trade. Brentano died in Munich.

Brentano was a Kathedersozialist (reform-minded) and a founding member of the Verein für Sozialpolitik . His influence on the social market economy, and on many Germans who would be leaders just after the end of World War II, can hardly be overrated.

Note: The mistake is often made to say that Brentano was called Ludwig Joseph, and that "Lujo" was a kind of nickname or contraction. This is incorrect; while he was called after a Ludwig and a Joseph, Lujo was his real and legal first name. (See his autobiography, Mein Leben..., below, p. 18.)

Bibliography:

• Brentano, Lujo (1871-72). Die Arbeitergilden der Gegenwart. 2 vols., Leipzig: Duncker und Humblot. (English: On the History and Development of Gilds and the Origins of Trade Unions. 1870.)
• Brentano, Lujo (1901). Ethik und Volkswirtschaft in der Geschichte. November 1901. München: Wolf.
• Brentano, Lujo (1910). "The Doctrine of Malthus and the Increase of Population During the Last Decades." Economic Journal vol. 20(79), pp. 371-93
• Brentano, Lujo (1923). Der wirtschaftende Mensch in der Geschichte. Leipzig: Meiner.
• Brentano, Lujo (1927-29). Eine Geschichte der wirtschaftlichen Entwicklung Englands. 4 vols., Jena: Gustav Fischer.
• Brentano, Lujo (1929). Das Wirtschaftsleben der antiken Welt. Jena: Fischer.
• Brentano, Lujo (1931). Mein Leben im Kampf um die soziale Entwicklung Deutschlands. Jena: Diederichs.

See also

• Liberalism
• List of liberal thinkers