This book expertly presents the first systematic research and comparative analysis ever attempted on the rise and early developments of the Economic Associations founded in Europe, the US and Japan during the nineteenth century. Contributors analyze the activities and debates promoted by these associations, evaluating their role in: the dissemination of political economy. the institutionalisation of economics. the construction of professional self-consciousness among economists. Individual chapters reconstruct the events that led to the foundation of economic societies in Britain, France, Italy, Belgium, Spain, Portugal, The Netherlands, Sweden, Germany, Japan and the US.