Cameralism, as a set of ideas,refers to a system of "sciences"whose professors recorded and attempted to extend and improve administrative practices to serve these monarchs. Such cameralists, often former administrators themselves, sought, as Louise Sommer has observed, "to work out a systematic account of the functioning of the various administrative services as a basis for the training of public officials" (Sommer, 1930). These "cameralists of the book," as Albion Small refers to them, were "distinguished from their contemporaries and from earlier and later theorists by constructing a 'science' or group of 'scieces' around the central consideration of the fiscal needs of the prince" (Small, 1909).