The eighteenth century was a period of intense geopolitical conflict and frequent wars, yet it also witnessed an unprecedented surge in trade, particularly colonial trade among the major empires. Within this dynamic context, Adam Smith formulated his inquiry into the wealth of nations. Scholars of Smith have often examined his perspectives on the interplay between trade and war. On one side,...
Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations is considered by many to be a foundational work for classical economics. Recent scholarship claims Smith’s other book, Theory of Moral Sentiments deserves a similar stature for behavioral economics. This paper considers the claim by examining Smith’s use of the endowment effect in his conceptualization of three pillars of his moral system: justice, prudence and...
Adam Smith, the Author of The Wealth of Nations: Our Visionary yet Observant Contemporary
Our contention here is that Adam Smith provides us with a rare case of being both an observant scholar of ‘here and now’ and an insightful ‘visionary’ of the processes unfolding in the longue durée. It is this latter attribute that makes him our contemporary after a quarter millennium. Because of the...
