Full article, William Rappard

William Rappard (1883-1958), Swiss historian, economist and international civil servant.

© Article written by Gabriel Godeffroy for the Central Europe Foundation

Photo: Boissonnas, “William Rappard”, 1942, Bibliothèque de Genève.

After receiving his doctorate in Law from the University of Geneva, he started his professional career in 1909 as a secretary at the International Labor Organization, based in Basel. After a few years of teaching, he was appointed Professor at the University of Geneva in 1913, where he also held the position of Rector from 1926 to 1928 and from 1936 to 1938. In 1928, he founded the Graduate Institute for Advanced International Studies in Geneva, which he directed until 1955. From 1920 to 1925, Rappard also worked for the League of Nations.

Throughout the 1930s, William Rappard “denounced the threat to peace posed by political and economic nationalism” and was an advocate of a united Europe. As the Director of the Graduate Institute, he invited Elemér Hantos to give a series of conferences on Central Europe in 1930.

--"William Emmanuel Rappard" (Dictionnaire historique de la Suisse)
--Michael A. Heilperin: “William E. Rappard: in memoriam” (Revue d’économie politique, vol. 69, no. 2, 1959, p. 229-233.)

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