Mercantilism

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth A. Reinert
Keyword(s):  
Adam Smith ◽  
Precious Metals ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
East India Company ◽  
Positive Development ◽  
Policy Position ◽  
Economic Nationalism ◽  
Western European ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Zero Sum

The notion of “mercantilism” or the “mercantile system” as a formal idea was identified by Adam Smith in his The Wealth of Nations. Smith had in mind a set of writers (the mercantilists) who were active in the 16th and 17th centuries, primarily but not exclusively in England. As commonly stated, mercantilist thought supported a policy position that countries should attempt to achieve trade surpluses that result in an inflow of “precious metals” or gold. In some renderings, this inflow of gold was seen as supporting royal treasuries. Mercantilism was often expressed as a system of economic nationalism. As such, it also had elements of a “zero sum” approach to international economics relations, although whether this “zero sum” thinking extended into the domestic realm is a matter of some debate. In recent decades, interpretations of what exactly mercantilism stood for have diverged significantly. This is perhaps a positive development as it provides layers of nuance to what had become a simplification of what mercantilist writers really stated, as well as differences of opinion among these writers. The origins of mercantilism are wrapped up with another school of thought—that of “bullionism,” which focused directly on transactions in precious metals. These two schools of thought had a significant temporal overlap, although mercantilism eventually prevailed. Mercantilism also became wrapped up in European colonial activities, from the British East India Company, some of whose spokesmen were mercantilist writers, to Prince Leopold’s Belgian Congo disaster. For this reason, it is important to consider the impacts of mercantilism both within the Western European context and within Western European colonial systems. While in the end the mercantilist emphasis on the balance of trade and, more broadly, economic nationalism was incorrect, modern analysis of the school of thought has revealed that the mercantilist writers were indeed engaged in real economic analysis. Key concepts uncovered by mercantilist writers included balance of payments accounting, trade in services, monetary theory, aggregate employment, exchange rate determination, and others. These insights secure mercantilism a place in the history of economic thought.

The Early History of Financial Economics, 1478–1776. By Geoffrey Poitras. Cheltenham and Northampton: Edward Elgar, 2000. Pp. x, 522.

2002 ◽  
Vol 62 (1) ◽  
pp. 268-269
Author(s):  
Larry Neal
Keyword(s):  
Economic History ◽  
Financial Analysis ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
Financial History ◽  
X 522 ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Simon Fraser University

Economic historians usually have to explain to their economist colleagues the difference between economic history, which focuses on facts, and history of economic thought, which focuses on ideas. Our colleagues in finance departments, typically fascinated by episodes in financial history treated by economic historians, are bound to be disappointed in the lack of attention given to the development of ideas in finance by historians of economic thought. Geoffrey Poitras, a professor of finance at Simon Fraser University, makes a valiant effort to remedy these oversights in his collection of vignettes that highlight the sophistication of financial instruments and analysts of financial markets well before the time of Adam Smith. Starting in 1478 with the publication of the Treviso Arithmetic, a typical textbook of commercial arithmetic for Italian merchants, and ending with brief snippets from the Wealth of Nations, Poitras treats the reader to a fascinating potpourri of excerpts from various manuals, brief biographies of pioneers in financial analysis, and historical discursions on foreign-exchange and stock markets.

scholarly journals What’s the problem, Mr. Smith? Shedding more light (than Heat) on Adam Smith’s view of man *

2018 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-28
Author(s):  
Emmanoel de Oliveira Boff
Keyword(s):  
Adam Smith ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Moral Sentiments ◽  
Impartial Spectator ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
Cast Doubt ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Theory Of Moral Sentiments

Abstract Why has the “Adam Smith Problem” recently been discussed in the literature? Although most historians of economic thought regard the problem solved, these discussions cast doubt on this apparent solution. This article suggests that the “Adam Smith Problem” may originate from the concept of the human being developed by Smith in the “Theory of Moral Sentiments”: in this book, human beings can be understood as composed of an empirical and a (quasi) transcendental side, in the form of the impartial spectator. It is argued that it is the tension between these two parts which creates supposed inconsistencies between aspects of the “Theory of Moral Sentiments” and the “Wealth of Nations” like, for example, the role of sympathy and self-interest in each of these books.

Dancing around the Bride: The Inter-Asian Competition for Japanese Copper, 1700–1760

Itinerario ◽  
2003 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 37-60
Author(s):  
Ryuto Shimada
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Economic Development ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
East India Company ◽  
Historical Study ◽  
Dutch East India Company ◽  
Systematic Analysis ◽  
Market Participants ◽  
English East India Company ◽  
Wealth Of Nations

Adam Smith, the well-known eighteenth-century economist, investigated a number of important themes regarding the Dutch East India Company (Verenigde Oostindbche Compagnie, VOC) as well as its counterpart, the English East India Company. These continue to provide principal topics in the historical study of the VOC. Through a systematic analysis, he came to the conclusion that free trade is more beneficial to the wealth of nations than monopolised trade. In his view, an economy based on the division of production along with competition among market participants was the best precondition for accelerating economic development.

Markets and Politics: The Human Product

1981 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert E. Lane
Keyword(s):  
Gross National Product ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Abraham Maslow ◽  
The West ◽  
Harmonious Development ◽  
Surplus Value ◽  
Material Reward ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Zero Sum ◽  
Prime Source

What values should a society seek to maximize? Religious values, as in Calvin's Geneva or Khomeini's Iran? Power and Glory? The Wealth of Nations, the Gross National Product? The greatest happiness for the greatest number? Or, in Humboldt's phrase, ‘the highest and most harmonious development of [man's] powers to a complete and consistent whole?’There is much to be said for wealth. Quite recently it has been discovered that the pursuit of wealth is a game against nature not a war game, a zero-sum game, with booty as its prize. The distribution of increments of wealth can, under these circumstances, be Pareto optimal. As Marx pointed out, winning the struggle against scarcity is a condition for everything else: men must eat before they can think. Similarly, in ordering a hierarchy of needs, the contemporary humanist psychologist, Abraham Maslow, makes the same obvious point: the satisfaction of physiological needs is a condition for the satisfaction of higher needs, in the end for self-fulfilment – for Humboldt's ‘harmonious development of man's powers’. Wealth gives satisfaction; Bentham believed it was the prime source of happiness. Adam Smith argued that ‘the desire of bettering our condition…[through] an augmentation of fortune’ was the most powerful (and vulgar) of motives, but it was often a mask for a concern for the good opinions of others. So strong a motive lends itself to social control: ‘the steadiest motive in ordinary business work is the desire for pay which is the material reward for work’. Like B. F. Skinner, Marshall held that money is a general reinforcer because of its universal appeal. And it is the foundation of civilization, not only because surplus value may be devoted to cathedrals, but, following Schumpeter, because a society guided by the rationalism of the market's manner of pursuing wealth, is reflected in the high art and science of the West. In the process of maximizing wealth, therefore, a society motivates its members, satisfies them, and provides the basis for high civilization.

Ibn Khaldun’s Fourteenth Century Views on Bureaucracy

1987 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 179-199
Author(s):  
Bogdan Mieczkowsici
Keyword(s):  
Economic Analysis ◽  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
Max Weber ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
Ibn Khaldun ◽  
Bureaucratic Organization ◽  
Economic Progress ◽  
Mode Of Operation ◽  
Wealth Of Nations

IntroductionAdam Smith observed in his Wealth of Nations in 1776 that kings-or inmy terminology the early bureaucratic leaders - existed already in “that rudestate of society which precedes the extension of commerce and the improvementof manufactures” (Smith 1976: 907). Max Weber considered bureaucracya necessary precondition for the development of society (Mieczkowski 1984:105-06; Zinam 1984: 77-78) providing the element of functional organizationand purpose. However, since power corrupts, it comes as no surprise thateven the early bureaucratic leaders developed some dysfunctional traits, thatcorruption all too frequently became the prevalent mode of operation, andthat the benign functional bureaucratic organizations, or ”borgs,” became inmany cases transformed into “dysborgs,” or the dysfunctional bureaucraticorganizations. An analysis of dysborgs and of some of their implications isoffered in Mieczkowski and Zinam, Bureaucracy, Ideology, Technology: Qualityof Life East and West (1984), and the terminology that is used in the presentessay to interpret historical views, with their original concepts, will befrom the Mieczkowski and Zinam book.Because the rudimentary bureaucratic organization developed early, someastute observers found already in remote times that bureaucracy is not alwaysbenign. It was, therefore, with great interest that I discovered one such observerwho had been neglected by Western historians of economic thought, exceptfor a footnote and a bare small-print mention in Joseph Schumpeter‘s Historyof Economic Analysis (1954: 136, 788), a footnote in Colin Clark’s Conditionsof Economic Progress (1957: 6), and a footnote in Barry Gordon’sEconomic Analysis Before Adam Smith (1957: 121). The writer in questionwas an Arab historian and philosopher, Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406), who coveredmany topics of interest to economists, and who in some respects was headof the founder of the science of economics, Adam Smith. Such occasional ...

scholarly journals Bisnis Dalam Peradaban Islam

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 155-170
Author(s):  
Sukma Mehilda
Keyword(s):  
Adam Smith ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
Direct Result ◽  
Business Practices ◽  
Muslim Countries ◽  
Modern Capitalism ◽  
Maximum Effort ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
The Right ◽  
Islamic Civilization

The most felt failure of modernization which is a direct result of the era of globalization is in the economic field. Modern capitalism which although finally able to prove its superiority from socialism, in fact, has given birth to various problems, especially for third world countries (including Muslim countries) which tend to be objects rather than subject to capitalism. Associated with the failure of Western capitalism in these Muslim countries, the realization that the roots of capitalism are not from Islam, then arouse the desire to reconstruct economic systems that are considered "authentic" derived from Islam. Moreover, history shows that economic thought has also been carried out by Islamic scholars, even long before Adam Smith wrote his monumental book The Wealth of Nations. In a very general sense, it can be said that the capitalist world is already very familiar with the teachings of Islam and its leaders. These conditions get the legitimacy of the verses of the Qur'an in collecting assets from a maximum effort. With so many verses of the Koran that teach the right way of business and wrong business practices even regarding very small matters, basically the position of business and commerce in Islamic civilization is very important.

The Emergence of Capitalism in Early America

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher W. Calvo
Keyword(s):  
Free Trade ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
Early America ◽  
Primary Position ◽  
History Of Capitalism ◽  
Early American ◽  
History Of ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
American Political Economy

The first comprehensive examination of early American economic thought in over a generation, The Emergence of Capitalism in Early America challenges the traditional narrative that Americans were born committed to the principles of Adam Smith. Americans are shown to have developed a distinct brand of hybrid capitalism, suited to the nation’s unique political, intellectual, cultural, and economic histories. Given America’s primary position in the history of capitalism, its economists were well situated to comment on market phenomenon. Covering a broad range of the period’s economic literature and offering close analyses of the antebellum reception of Smith’s Wealth of Nations, this book rescues America’s first economists from historical neglect. In thematically organized chapters, the intellectual cultures of American protectionism and free trade are examined. Protectionism exercised enormous influence in the discourse, constituting what rightly has been called an ‘American political economy.’ Henry Carey is highlighted as the central thinker in protectionist thought, providing an economic blueprint for the nation’s future industrial and commercial supremacy. Sharp regional divisions existed among the nation’s strongest proponents of free-trade ideology, namely Calhoun, Wayland, McVickar, Vethake, Cardozo, and Cooper, as well as important theoretical distinctions with Smithian-inspired laissez-faire. In a separate chapter, American conservative economists—among others, Fitzhugh and Holmes—are positioned alongside antebellum socialists—Skidmore and Byllesby—illustrating the rather awkward ideological arrangements attendant to emergent capitalism. Finally, the tricky relationship Americans have held with financial institutions is explored. Beginning with Hamilton, this book analyzes the financial literature as Americans learned to live with arguably the most complex and misunderstood manifestation of capitalism—finance.

Two Intellectual Landmarks in the Year 1749

2019 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 101-123
Author(s):  
Farhad Rassekh
Keyword(s):  
Paradigm Shift ◽  
David Hume ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Considerable Extent ◽  
Monetary Theory ◽  
Economic Theories ◽  
Classical Economics ◽  
Wealth Of Nations ◽  
Economic Thinking

In the year 1749 Adam Smith conceived his theory of commercial liberty and David Hume laid the foundation of his monetary theory. These two intellectual developments, despite their brevity, heralded a paradigm shift in economic thinking. Smith expanded and promulgated his theory over the course of his scholarly career, culminating in the publication of The Wealth of Nations in 1776. Hume elaborated on the constituents of his monetary framework in several essays that were published in 1752. Although Smith and Hume devised their economic theories in 1749 independently, these theories complemented each other and to a considerable extent created the structure of classical economics.

REVIVING ECONOMIC THOUGHT BY MANNAN PERPECTIVE

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 353-378
Author(s):  
Muhammad Majdy Amiruddin ◽  
Muhammad Ismail ◽  
Hasanuddin Hasim
Keyword(s):  
Adam Smith ◽  
Main Idea ◽  
Scientific Work ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
Small Contribution ◽  
Literature Study ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
Study Techniques ◽  
Islamic Economic ◽  
Modern Era

The reviving of modern economic theory is usually stated starting from the publication of Adam Smith's The Wealth of Natoins, in 1776, although other thinkers who first also gave no small contribution. The main idea put forward by Adam Smith is that competition between various suppliers of goods and buyers will produce the best possibilities in the distribution of goods and services because it will encourage everyoe to do the specialization and increase in capital so that it will produce more value with a permanent workforce. From the Islamic perspective, there are several names that commonly known such, Baqir, Umar Chapra, and Mannan. The purpose of this research is to explore the revival economic though by Abdul Mannan. This research adapts content analysis method, which is a researcher conducts a discussion of the contents of written or edition information in the mass media. The data analysis techniques of this scientific work use literature study techniques, comparative, induction, and deduction. The study began by collecting literature data from Muhammad Abdul Mannan's Concept of Thinking about the Development of Modern Era Islamic economics and Modern Era Islamic Economic concepts in general, (researchers only participated in the discussion). Then proceed with the interpretation that researchers try to understand Muhammad Abdul Mannan's thoughts about the Development of Islamic Economics in the Modern Era. The result of this reseacrh indicates that the revival of Islamic thought by determining basic economic functions that simply cover three functions, namely consumption, production and distribution. Those basics are rooted by Five basic principles rooted in Shariah for basic economic functions in the form of consumption functions are the principles of righteousness, cleanliness, moderation, benefit and morality

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