Commerce and Corruption

Hanley, Ryan Patrick

doi:10.1177/1474885107086445

Cited by 33 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…But at the same time, Smith clearly foresaw the possible consequence of such an ethics if pursued to its conclusion -namely that an individual shaped by the morality of sympathy would be preeminently a slave to the strong need that men have for the approbation of their fellows'. 66 This explains why…”

Section: Praise and Praiseworthinessmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Such individuals, plagued by solicitude for recognition, can no longer achieve the simple goodness natural to them in their uncorrupted, selfsufficient state'. 44 Living always in the eyes of others, men developed the distinction between being and appearing to be -between être and paraître -and in the process lost the capacity for virtue, possessing only its simulacrum in the gratification of amour propre.…”

Section: Praise and Praiseworthinessmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…'To avoid such slavishness, nature invested man with a second side…in which the praises of others are mitigated by a natural regard for what is praiseworthy'. 45 Man desired not simply to appear virtuous, but to be virtuous. Indeed, Smith went so far as to claim that 'so far is the love of praise-worthiness from being derived altogether from that of praise; that the love of praise seems, at least in a great measure, to be derived from that of praiseworthiness'.…”

Section: Praise and Praiseworthinessmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…43 According to Rousseau, 'commercial society stimulates in men a desire for esteem and consideration such that they can only live in the eyes and opinions of others. Such individuals, plagued by solicitude for recognition, can no longer achieve the simple goodness natural to them in their uncorrupted, selfsufficient state'.…”

Section: Praise and Praiseworthinessmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Smith and Rousseau, after Hume and Mandeville

Sagar

2016

Political Theory

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This essay re-examines Adam Smith’s encounter with Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Against the grain of present scholarship it contends that when Smith read and reviewed Rousseau’s Second Discourse, he neither registered it as a particularly important challenge, nor was especially influenced by, or subsequently preoccupied with responding to, Rousseau. The case for this is made by examining the British context of Smith’s own intervention in his 1759 Theory of Moral Sentiments, where a proper appreciation of the roles of David Hume and Bernard Mandeville in the formation of Smith’s thought pushes Rousseau firmly into the background. Realising this, however, forces us to re-consider our evaluations of Rousseau’s and Smith’s very different political visions. Given that questions of individual recognition, economic inequality, and political stability remain at the heart of today’s social challenges, the implications of this are not just historical but of direct contemporary import.

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Section: Praise and Praiseworthinessmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Praise and Praiseworthinessmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Praise and Praiseworthinessmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Praise and Praiseworthinessmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Smith and Rousseau, after Hume and Mandeville

Sagar

2016

Political Theory

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“…Nonetheless, Smith hinted at the possibility for the individual to recover a sense of self-sufficiency in being oriented towards purely praiseworthy activities, even though commercial society appeared more obviously to reward what Ryan Hanley has called "the love of praise characteristic of the bourgeois". 118 To engage in the struggle to enjoy economic surplus as lifestyle adornments is meritorious only to the extent that merit is sought in praise. Crucially, the means of demonstrating that such praise is deserved requires the value system of commercial society to be transcended altogether.…”

Section: Smith and The Moral Threats Of Commercial Societymentioning

confidence: 99%

The eighteenth-century historiographic tradition and contemporary ‘Everyday IPE’

Watson¹

2012

Rev. Int. Stud.

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AbstractThis article focuses on Adam Smith's largely sympathetic response to the Rousseauian critique of the moral degeneracy of modern ‘economic man’. It thus emphasises his philosophical ambivalence towards commercial society over the textbook IPE presentations which ascribe to him an almost wholly unreflexive market advocacy. In doing so it provides important methodological lessons for the study of Everyday IPE today. Arnaldo Momigliano has identified a decisive break in historical method in the eighteenth century, of which Smith and Rousseau were key exponents. However unwittingly, contemporary Everyday IPE scholars are the spiritual heirs of the eighteenth-century move from writing public histories of the state to writing private histories of unnamed individuals who embody the most recent phase of human sociability. The eighteenth-century economic man was conceptualised in relation to evolving forms of economic organisation, where the economy in turn was thought to reflect the prevailing system of ‘manners’. Smith united with Rousseau in the belief that their society's bourgeois politeness allowed materialist ideologies to corrupt the moral autonomy of the individual. The historical method underpinning such concerns also allows Everyday IPE scholars to ground similarly-styled attempts to understand threats to moral autonomy arising from the struggle over economic surplus today.

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Capitalism and the Good Society: The Original Case for and Against Commerce

Cullen

2022

Standard of Living

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Commerce and Corruption

Cited by 33 publications

References 2 publications

Smith and Rousseau, after Hume and Mandeville

Smith and Rousseau, after Hume and Mandeville

The eighteenth-century historiographic tradition and contemporary ‘Everyday IPE’

Capitalism and the Good Society: The Original Case for and Against Commerce

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