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- Implications for Debate
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- CONTEXT IS KEY TO HUMAN MORALS
- UNRESTRAINED LIBERTY IS THE HIGHEST SOCIAL GOOD
An Imperfect SystemUninformed political thinkers often contrast Adam Smith and Karl Marx as polar opposites. While it is true that Smith favored Laizzes Faire Capitalism and Marx longed for communal ownership of the means of production, the two thinkers were both political economists, and this made them members of the same philosophical family. Both believed that the economic base of society was a chief determinant of the aspects of the rest of society, and both believed Capitalism would result in a natural, sometimes efficient, division of labor. Smith, however, was far more optimistic about both human nature and the viability of the market than Marx. His optimism failed to foresee many of those downsides of the free market which Marx would refer to as “internal contradictions.” Smith’s belief in social cohesion, it has been charged, blinded him to the fact that the market almost never correct itself in the natural and easygoing way Smith predicted. Instead, Marxists and others point to those periodic crises of overproduction which result in inflation and decreased buying power for all but the very rich. Moreover, even Smith occasionally admitted that unchecked Capitalism would result in large scale alienation of the dispossessed. capitalism is, after all, a “game,” and in any contest there must be winners and losers. In this case the losers may not merely be those who lose all their money, but may also be the spiritually alienated workers and bureaucrats whose sole function is to keep the machines of the game running. In earlier times, craftsmen made and sold their products in such a way as to identify themselves with their work. A shoemaker who devotes considerable attention to his cobbling will presumably identify with his finished product much more than a worker in a modern shoe factory who must simply put one piece of the shoe together, over and over, for ten hours every day. A market economy rewards technological innovations such as mass production, but one result of mass production is, in Marxian terms, the alienation of the worker from his or her product. Capitalism may result in other forms of alienation as well. Workers forced to compete with each other for jobs might easily stop seeing each other as fellow human beings and begin to see them as threats to their livelihood. The massive class divisions of owners, workers, middle managers, the unemployed, etc., surely cannot result in the cohesion that Smith envisioned. Rather, what is likely to happen is widespread hatred and even social violence. Likewise, economic competition often leads to international conflicts over resources, as suggested by a Marxist of the 1991 Persian Gulf War. Implications for DebateDebaters wishing to employ the philosophies of Adam Smith will find many notable quotes and principles explaining the tenants of Capitalism. But Smith also wrote about other issues, such as the limits of reason and the importance of individual freedom. Many resolutions ask for the comparison of social and individual needs. Stating these needs in economic terms might have a distinct advantage over their expression in abstract, philosophical terms: Economics is based on a materialist and pragmatic view of the world which can be expressed in concrete, “real world” terms. Debaters wanting to develop such strategies ought to read a little economic theory and familiarize themselves with the great economists such as Smith, Ricardo, Marx, and others. BIBLIOGRAPHYBrown, Maurice. ADAM SMITH’S ECONOMICS (London: Croom Helm, 1988). Fry, Michael (Ed). ADAM SMITH’S LEGACY (London: Routledge, 1992). Fulton, Robert Brank. ADAM SMITH SPEAKS TO OUR TIMES: A STUDY OF HIS ETHICAL IDEAS (Boston: Christopher Publishing House, 1963). Lux, Kenneth. ADAM SMITH’S MISTAKE (Boston: Shambhala, 1990). Scott, William Robert. ADAM SMITH AS STUDENT AND PROFESSOR (New York: A.M. Kelley, 1965). Small, Albion Woodbury. ADAM SMITH AND MODERN SOCIOLOGY (Clifton: A.M. Kelley, 1972). Smith, Adam. THE THEORY OF MORAL SENTIMENTS (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1976). _______ THE WEALTH OF NATIONS (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1976). ________ ESSAYS ON PHILOSOPHICAL SUBJECTS (Indianapolis: Liberty Classics, 1982). Werhane, Patricia H. ADAM SMITH AND HIS LEGACY FOR MODERN CAPITAUSM (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991). _______ ADAM SMITH AND MODERN ECONOMICS (Hants, England: Edward Elgar, 1990). West, E.G. ADAM SMITH (New York: Arlington House, 1969). CONTEXT IS KEY TO HUMAN MORALS1. REASON ALONE CANNOT DETERMINE RIGHT AND WRONG Adam Smith, in Maurice Brown. ADAM SMITH’S ECONOMICS, 1988, p. 63. (I)t is altogether absurd and unintelligible to suppose that the first perceptions of right and wrong can be derived from reason, even in those particular cases upon the experience of which the general rules are formed. These first perceptions, as well as all other experiments upon which general rules are founded, cannot be the object of reason, but of immediate sense and feeling.
Adam Smith, in Maurice Brown. ADAM SMITH’S ECONOMICS, 1988, p. 64. Philosophers have, of late years, considered chiefly the tendency of affections, and have given little attention to the relation which they stand in to the cause that excites them. In common life, however, when we judge of any person’s conduct, and of the sentiments which directed it, we constantly consider them under both these aspects.
Adam Smith, in Maurice Brown. ADAM SMITH’S ECONOMICS, 1988, p. 118. Laws frequently continue in force long after the circumstances, which gave occasion to them, and which alone could render them reasonable are no more. UNRESTRAINED LIBERTY IS THE HIGHEST SOCIAL GOOD1. OUR FREE ACTIONS INCREASE SOCIAL GOOD EVEN IF WE ARE UNAWARE OF IT Adam Smith, in Maurice Brown. ADAM SMITH’S ECONOMICS, 1988, p. 129. As every individual, therefore, endeavors as much as he can both to employ his capital in the support of domestic industry, and so to direct that industry that is produce may be of the greatest value; every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which is no part of his intention.
Adam Smith, in Edwin G. West. ADAM SMITH AND MODERN ECONOMICS, 1990, p. 15. All systems either of preference or restraint, therefore, being thus completely taken away, the obvious and simple system of natural liberty establishes itself of its own accord. Every man, as long as he does not violate the laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest in his own way, and to bring both his industry and his capital into competition with those of any other man, or order of men. 3. NO NATURAL INEQUALITY EXISTS--PEOPLE HAVE BASICALLY THE SAME ABILITIES Adam Smith, in Edwin G. West. ADAM SMITH AND MODERN ECONOMICS, 1990, p. 37. The difference of natural talents in different men is, in reality, much less than we are aware of; and the very different genius which appears to distinguish men of different professions, when grown up to maturity, is not upon many occasions so much the cause, as the effect of the division of labor. The difference between the most dissimilar characters, between a philosopher and a common street porter, for example, seems to arise not so much from nature, as from habit, custom, and education. 4. PEOPLE WHO ARE DENIED OPPORTUNITY WILL NOT GROW IN ABILITY Adam Smith, in Edwin G. West. ADAM SMITH AND MODERN ECONOMICS, 1990, p. 46. The man whose life is spent in performing a few simple operations...becomes as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become. The torpor of his mind renders him not only incapable of relishing or bearing a part in any rational conversation, but of concerning any generous, noble or tender sentiment, and consequently of forming any just judgment concerning many even of the ordinary duties of private life. (ellipse in original)
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