Vernon Smith's Explanation of Moral Sentiments

This paper is a comment on Vernon Smith's paper, Adam Smith: from propriety and sentiments to property and wealth. This paper argues that while Vernon Smith is correct in his analysis that Adam Smith's theory of human nature, as expressed in The Theory of Moral Sentiments, provides a much more accurate model of behavior than does that of utility maximization, Vernon Smith's analysis can be much enriched by including a more complete explanation of Adam Smith's model of human behavior to include an analysis of prudence, justice, beneficence, and self-command.     

Sentiments and Motivations in Adam Smith and Vernon Smith

Vernon Smith (VS) discovered Adam Smith (AS) late in his professional career, and has adopted ideas from The Theory of Moral Sentiments to explain findings in experimental economics. Most important is the theorized link between moral sentiments and the evolution of property rights and law as foundations for commerce. VS's encounter with AS, while not new, provides a compelling look at the modern laboratory of social science through the lens of the Enlightenment, and cannot easily be encapsulated within a utilitarian framework. This paper provides an overview and commentary on VS's approach.     

风险投资中道德风险和可转换证券关系的分析

可转换证券在风险投资中发挥着多种作用。本文论证了它在解决道德风险方面的功能。首先设置了在不存在道德风险时的模型;然后,用模型推导出在信息不对称情况下的最优合约的特点;阐述了风险投资中使用可转换证券的原因并且给出了简单的建议。     

All in the best possible taste: Adam Smith and the leaders of fashion

Adam Smith devotes a great deal of attention to the role of fashion in the relationship between the social classes. Smith's general account of fashion is grounded on the transmission of fashion from the rich to the poor. However, when it comes to accounting for the generation of fashion amongst the wealthy class, Smith's account moves away from wealth distinctions and focuses instead on more sophisticated forms of social judgement. This paper examines Smith's general account of fashion between the classes and then identifies the refinements to the account that he provides when he considers the operation of fashion amongst the rich. The paper suggests that the operative distinction among the wealthy is not relative wealth, but rather reputation for taste, and concludes with a discussion of the “man of taste” in Smith's account of fashion.     

From merchants to speakers: The common origins of trade and language

Abstract

Adam Smith argued that division of labour and language are linked to the concept of persuasion. However, this paper asserts that trade in the long term and linguistic communication have their roots in trust and probity since both imply some sort of mutuality. If not, neither one nor the other would occur as strategies in repetitive games show.     

Problems of Modern Technology

This essay identifies a contradiction between the flourishing interest in the environmental economics of the classical period and a lack of critical parsing of the works of its leading representatives. Its focus is the work of Adam Smith and Thomas Malthus. It offers a critical analysis of their contribution to environmental thought and surveys the work of their contemporary devotees. It scrutinizes Smith's contribution to what Karl Polanyi termed the "economistic fallacy," as well as his defenses of class hierarchy, the "growth imperative" and consumerism. It subjects to critical appraisal Malthus's enthusiasm for private property and the market system, and his opposition to market regulation. While Malthus's principal attraction to ecological economists lies in his having allegedly broadened the scope of economics, and in his narrative of scarcity, this article shows that he, in fact, narrowed the scope of the discipline and conceptualized scarcity in a reified and pseudo-scientific way.     

Rhetoric and logic in Smith's Description of the Division of Labor

Abstract

This article analyses the first chapter of the Wealth of Nations, where the division of labour is defined and its effects described. It first shows the rhetoric and logical effects that are used to win the reader's goodwill. Then it reviews nineteenth century debates on the validity of the theory. Finally, it cites three real cases, where the division of labour does not increase the productive power of labour. In conclusion, it suggests that the theory on division of labour appears to require some adjustment, while acknowledging that some of the facts underlying arguments in its support are naturally true.     

儒家乐论与道德涵养刍议

儒家哲学从来都是生命的学问。＂乐＂作为儒家文明中重要的一支,也一直涵养着中国人的道德生命和精神生命。同时＂以乐化德＂,在具体实践中是有它的可操作性。用乐来涵养道德不仅符合现代人的认知方式,让人比较容易接受,而且这种潜移默化可以达到移风易俗的作用,形成悠久的良好社会风气。     

德商与领导德行力开发

德商和德行力是当前领导力开发研究的热点问题之一。本文在相关文献研究的基础上．详细介绍了德商定义、德商对智商和情商的导向作用,说明了如何将德商分解成领导德行力,并提出了领导德行力开发的几点建议。     

Adam Smith on the subordination of wage-earners in the commercial society

Abstract

Adam Smith's discourse on wage labour is both original for its time and complex. While Smith indisputably considered the substitution of serfdom by wage labour as an improvement in both opulence and independence, we argue that he nevertheless saw the wage relationship as one founded on subordination. We then cast light on the material factors and symbolic mechanisms which, in his writings, explain how and why the worker agrees to this subordination. Finally, we endeavour to show that Smith's praise for the system of natural liberty as well as his repeated criticisms of merchants and capital owners aimed to transcend this issue.     

Trustworthiness as a Moral Determinant of Economic Activity: Lessons from the Classics

This paper reviews the way that social norms and ethical values in general, and trustworthiness in particular, is perceived to affect the behavior of economic agents in view of the work of Adam Smith, Nassau William Senior and John Stuart Mill. Classical Political economists held that economic actions are context-dependent and thus constantly under the influence of social norms and values. It is further suggested here that Classical Economists had established that trustworthiness acts as a general ethical precondition for the efficient behaviour of the markets and an important asset of the national social capital.     

诚信道德资本的生成机理及其价值实现

在现代市场经济条件下，诚信不仅是市场经济运行的基础和保障，而且也是一种能够被投入经济运行过程并增进社会财富的道德资本。诚信道德资本的生成，一方面是市场法则作用的必然结果，另一方面也在于完善的市场经济能够产生诚信道德资本的自动供给机制。诚信道德资本在经济运行过程中的投入与运作能够带来极大的经济效益。     

Fragments of Development: Nation,Gender, and the Space of Modernity

Adam Smith argued that capitalism was best achieved when individuals temper their economic self-interests with ethically grounded motivations. Unfortunately, Smith stopped short of articulating precisely how individuals might manage these seemingly competing interests in a way that is practical for actors in modern day organizations. We believe that a set of effective principles of justice can be found in the writings of political philosopher John Rawls. We argue that due to the empirical realities of entrepreneurs, the entrepreneurial context is aligned with Rawls' original position. We consider how Rawls' principles might inform founders of new organizations with regard to their interaction with organizational stakeholders.     

Jacob Viner on Adam Smith: Development and reception of a theological reading

Abstract

Jacob Viner was one of the most important interpreters of Adam Smith's work, particularly for his emphasis in a classic 1927 article on Smith's theological framework, his discussion of the relationship between the Theory of Moral Sentiments and the Wealth of Nations and dismantling of a popular view of Smith as a doctrinaire advocate of laissez-faire. What is less well known is that Viner's theological reading of Smith developed over the next 40 years through intense study of eighteenth century natural theology, and some of his views changed. This article traces the development of Viner's interpretation of Smith. It assesses the suggestion of D.D. Raphael that Smith moved away from a theological framework over time and that Viner repudiated his theological reading of Smith. I argue instead that Viner's mature work broadened and strengthened the theological reading. Much of the literature on Smith and Viner wrongly assumes that naturalistic explanation and theological frameworks are mutually exclusive. This may be the dominant twentieth century view, but it was not so in the eighteenth century, as Viner well understood.     

Wealth and sensibility. The historical outcome of better living conditions for all according to Adam Smith

In this paper, I argue that Smith's commercial society is characterised more by restraint of self-command than by restraint of emotions through self-command, as usually stated. According to Smith, the appropriate degree of self-command varies with historical circumstances: better living conditions for all favour relaxation of self-command and lead people to express their sentiments more freely. I thus highlight a crucial link in Smith's thought between variations in general economic conditions and variations in moral judgement on the expression of emotions, or, in other words, between The Theory of Moral Sentiments and the Wealth of Nations.     

How to pay for the war in times of imperfect commitment: Adam Smith and David Ricardo on the sinking fund

The paper proposes a comparative analysis of Smith's and Ricardo's views on the sinking fund. It shows that Smith and Ricardo agreed in stressing the ineffectiveness of the sinking fund as a policy instrument targeted at public debt repayment and tax-burden relief, pointing out that its actual workings had paradoxically helped to increase rather than reduce British total debt-load. Moreover, their explanation of the sinking fund paradox integrates a defective fiscal commitment technology with powerful politicians’ incentives to siphon off the money stored in the sinking fund to meet sudden increases of public expenditure whenever the occasion arose.     

Early Smithian economics in the Spanish empire: J. H. Vieytes and colonial policy *

Juan Hipolito Vieytes (1762–1815)was a hero of the May 1810 Revolution in Buenos Aires and one of the early economists in the River Plate area. Although Robert Sidney Smith dismissed Vieytes as a very minor figure in Spanish economic thought, this article attempts to show that Vieytes, an entrepreneur and journalist and only self-taught in political economy, was an early and able follower and divulgator of Smithian economics. He advocated free trade and liberal economic reforms, pointing at the competitiveness of the domestic workshops or ‘popular industry’ in a country with scanty population and extensive and cheap land.     

Accounting for the wealth of Denmark: a case study of Smithian growth using the emergence of modern accounting in Danish dairying

Abstract

The idea of “Smithian growth” rests on a “natural” development out of agriculture through capital accumulation, and the division of labour. We confront these concepts with an “historical experiment” and the case of Danish agriculture in the nineteenth century. Specifically, we look at how accounting was used to promote specialization, ultimately in butter production, leading to the massive increases in productivity that Smith predicted. We also observe the emergence of Smithian “philosophers”. This ultimately led to the capital-intensive industrialization of Danish agriculture through butter factories, and general development. We argue that this establishes the historical relevance of Smith’s theories.     

Defending free trade after physiocracy: On Dugald Stewart's architectonic of passions,reason and Providence

Abstract

Dugald Stewart (1753–1828) defended free trade in light of a providential account of Nature, according to which there would be an “identity of interests” (Halévy 1901–1904). He thereby tried to rid economic thought of references to conflicts and thus pursued the physiocrats’ programme rather than Adam Smith's. In fact, Stewart claimed that (i) self-love depends on an accommodation to Providence, by which individuals restrain their passions; (ii) self-love fosters actions that lead to a direct increase of public happiness; (iii) the perfectibility of mind allows to dismiss “legal despotism”, which can be replaced by religious education.     

基于公平偏好下的风险企业家道德风险研究

风险企业家在向风险投资家寻求融资共同发展风险项目的过程中表现出有限理性,具有公平偏好心理,其往往因为嫉妒心理而影响到自身的努力水平,这样,风险投资中的道德风险问题不可避免,进而会损害到风险投资家的利益。本文从有限理性的角度出发,通过设计针对具有公平偏好的风险企业家的有效激励机制,以此来分析和防范公平偏好心理带来的道德风险问题。研究表明,风险投资家应尽可能选择公平偏好程度较小的风险企业家作为投资对象,以减少或规避风险投资市场中的道德风险。