scholarly journals The debating tradition in Britain and the new political economy: William Thompson and John Stuart Mill at the London Co-operative Society in 1825

Nova Economia ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 609-636
Author(s):  
Carlos Leonardo Kulnig Cinelli ◽  
Rogério Arthmar
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Social Change ◽  
John Stuart Mill ◽  
Economic Benefits ◽  
Historical Background ◽  
General Context ◽  
Jeremy Bentham ◽  
Individual Liberty ◽  
Free Competition ◽  
Working People

Abstract: This paper reviews the debate between William Thompson and John Stuart Mill that happened at the London Co-operative Society in 1825 over the advantages of cooperation as against free competition. The general context of the controversy is provided by some historical background on British debating tradition within the working people. Next, the philosophical doctrines of Jeremy Bentham and Robert Owen are outlined as the main forces of social change in the 1820s, both of which would collide during the faceoff at the Co-operative Society. Following that, we examine William Thompson’s ideas on income distribution and the moral evils of competition. Lastly, we present John Mill’s approach to these same issues, showing that his basic conception of individual liberty did not change throughout his life, despite his late agreement with the economic benefits of cooperation. The final remarks stress the originality of the theoretical elements put forth in the debate.

scholarly journals Retrospectives: On the Genius Behind David Ricardo's 1817 Formulation of Comparative Advantage

2018 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 227-240
Author(s):  
Daniel M. Bernhofen ◽  
John C. Brown
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Comparative Advantage ◽  
John Stuart Mill ◽  
Gains From Trade ◽  
200Th Anniversary ◽  
Analytical Results ◽  
Ricardian Model ◽  
Logical Sense

Last year marked the 200th anniversary of Ricardo’s famous “four numbers” paragraph on comparative advantage, which is one of the oldest analytical results in economics. Following the lead of James Mill (1821), these four numbers have been interpreted as unit labor coefficients. This interpretation has provided the basis for the development of the ‘Ricardian model’ from John Stuart Mill (1852) to Eaton and Kortum (2002). However, if we accept the labor unit interpretation of these numbers, Ricardo’s exposition in his 1817 Principles of Political Economy and Taxation makes little logical sense. Building on Sraffa’s (1930) interpretation of Ricardo’s numbers as labor embodied in trade, our discussion reveals the amazing simplicity and generality of Ricardo’s comparative advantage formulation and gains-from-trade logic.

scholarly journals Optimal fishing mortality assignment for southern hake Merluccius australis in Chile

2020 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 613-625
Author(s):  
Felipe Lopez ◽  
Jorge Jimenez ◽  
Cristian Canales
Keyword(s):  
Mortality Rate ◽  
Economic Benefit ◽  
Mortality Rates ◽  
Fish Population ◽  
Fishing Effort ◽  
Economic Benefits ◽  
Historical Background ◽  
Total Catch ◽  
Fishing Mortality ◽  
Objective Functions

Since 1979, southern hake (Merluccius australis) has been exploited in Chile from the Bio Bio to the Magallanes regions, between the parallels 41°28.6'S and 57°S. There is evidence of a constant fishing effort and a sustained reduction of the fish population, consistent with a progressive decrease in total annual catches. Management strategies based on the maximum sustainable yield (MSY) and quota assignment/ distribution criteria have not been able to sustain acceptable biomass levels. A non-linear optimization model with two objective functions was proposed to determine an optimal total catch quota for more sustainable exploitation of this fishery. The first function maximizes the total catch over time in response to an optimal assignment of fishing mortality rates per fleet; the second function maximizes the total economic benefit associated with the total catch. The dynamics of the fish population were represented with the equations of a predictive age-structured model. Decision variables were fishing mortality rates and annual catch quotas per fleet, subject to constraints that guarantee a minimum level of biomass escape over a long-term period. The input parameters were obtained from the last stock evaluation report carried out by the Instituto de Fomento Pesquero (IFOP) of Chile. The historical background data of the fishery and the regulatory framework were relevant aspects of the methodology. Five scenarios were evaluated with the two objective functions, including a base scenario, which considered the referential mortality rate as input data as the average mortality rate per fleet from 2007 to 2012. Total economic benefits fluctuate between 102 and USD 442 million for total catches in the range of 108 to 421 thousand tons, which were obtained from maximizing the economic and biological objective functions. Economic benefit/catch ratios were reduced for scenarios with higher constraints on catch limits, and they were more efficient from a biological point of view. Situations with lighter constraints showed in general higher economic benefits and better performance ratios than those with stronger restrictions. The use of optimization models may provide a useful tool to evaluate the effect of regulations for adequate conservation and economical utilization of a limited resource.

John Stuart Mill on China’s Stationary State

2021 ◽  
pp. 833-856
Author(s):  
Yue Xiao
Keyword(s):  
Stationary State ◽  
Capital Accumulation ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Mutual Effect ◽  
John Stuart Mill ◽  
East India Company ◽  
Stationary States ◽  
Individual Liberty ◽  
The West ◽  
Economic Stagnation

Current literature on John Stuart Mill’s writings about Asia have focused mainly on his relationship with India because of Mill’s thirty-five year career in the East India Company. Scholars in both China and the West have not paid attention to Mill’s views on China. This paper delves into Mill’s notion of China’s stationary state from two perspectives: (1) a stationary state of capital accumulation and (2) a stationary state of human improvement. In Principles, Mill explained his conception of stationary state. He linked China’s economic stagnation to the low desire for capital accumulation. In On Liberty and Considerations, Mill explored the reasons for China’s stagnancy in human improvement. He discussed the negative impact of the “despotism of custom” on individual liberty and the defects of a bureaucratic government in nineteenth-century China. Mill thought that a stationary state of capital accumulation does not necessarily imply a stationary state of human improvement. However, he seemed to argue that, in China, these two types of stationary states have a mutual effect upon each other.

Epilogue

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bart Schultz
Keyword(s):  
Personal Growth ◽  
John Stuart Mill ◽  
William Godwin ◽  
Jeremy Bentham ◽  
Henry Sidgwick

This book has explored some of the doubts and possibilities for different readings of the classical utilitarians, both positive and negative. It has shown how William Godwin, Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, Henry Sidgwick, and others were forever engaged in tackling both the reasons—or the pleasures and pains—and the persons together, instead of separating them, in often breathtaking visions of a future of maximally happy beings who had through education and personal growth achieved their utilitarian potential. It has also discussed how utilitarianism had become more entangled in imperialistic politics at precisely the point when it lost its foundational philosophical confidence, when it was forced to confront the incoherence of its own accounts of such fundamental notions as happiness, reason, pleasure, and pain.

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