[Pierre Émile]. French economist, born in Paris on the 8th of December 1828. Educated in Paris, he began to teach in the lycée at Alençon in 1852, and in 1857 was chosen professor of rhetoric at Besançon. He returned to Paris to become professor at the lycée Saint Louis, and in 1868 he was chosen a member of the academy of moral and political sciences. In 1872 he was appointed professor of geography, history and statistics in the Collège de France, and subsequently became also professor at the Conservatoire des arts et métiers and at the École libre des sciences politiques. Levasseur was one of the founders of the study of commercial geography, and became a member of the Council of Public Instruction, president of the French society of political economy and honorary president of the French geographical society.
His numerous writings include the following: Histoire des classes ouvrières en France depuis la conquête de Jules César jusquà la Révolution (1859); Histoire des classes ouvrières en France depuis la Révolution jusquà nos jours (1867); LÉtude et lenseignement de la géographie (1871); La Population française (18891892); LAgriculture aux États-Unis (1894); LEnseignement primaire dans les pays civilisés (1897); LOuvrier américain (1898); Questions ouvrières et industrielles sous la troisième République (1907); and Histoire des classes ouvrières et de lindustrie en France de 1789 à 1870 (19031904). He also published a Grand Atlas de géographie physique et politique (18901892). He died on the 9th of July 1911.