In 1719, Daniel Defoe wrote his first fiction The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe without knowing that the protagonist of the novel, Robinson Crusoe, would be liberated from his cultural matrix and deployed as a dominant economic metaphor with the advent of the so-called marginalist revolution in the second half of the nineteenth century. This thesis intends to: i) with reference to an habits of thought approach, unearth the institutional nature of the metamorphosis of Crusoe from a figure of the literary realm to the economic man of neoclassical economics, and ii) based on a rereading of Defoe&rsquo / s original text, offer an alternative reinterpretation which would turn upside down the prevalent presuppositions of neoclassical economics portraying an isolated, universal and axiomatically rational Crusoe. Accordingly, in this study, Crusoe is presented as a specific time- and space-bound human being preserving and perpetuating his institutionally forged character traits even during his sojourn on the &lsquo / institution-free&rsquo / uninhabited island / a methodological and expeditious man, whose rationality was based not on the fulfillment of axioms but on reasoning / and an entrepreneur aiming at economic development through innovation.

This study compares the National Economy concept as it is employed in Friedrich List&rsquo / s works with its theoretical reflections among Ottoman intelligentsia, particularly in Ziya G&ouml / kalp. The effects of National Economy on the Ottoman thought is examined by bearing in mind two journals: T&uuml / rk Yurdu and Iktisadiyat Mecmuasi. The field of application of National Economy is explicated by an analysis of the first steps towards industrialization, especially after the Young Turk Revolution of 1908. It attempts to find answers to the questions as to how and to what degree the theoretical development of National Economy affected the Ottoman economic policies implemented.