Adam Smith and the Character of Virtue

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Edition: 1st
Format: Hardcover
Pub. Date: 2009-06-22
Publisher(s): Cambridge University Press
List Price: $127.00

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Summary

Recent years have witnessed a renewed debate over the costs at which the benefits of free markets have been bought. This book revisits the moral and political philosophy of Adam Smith, capitalism's founding father, to recover his understanding of the morals of the market age. In so doing it illuminates a crucial albeit overlooked side of Smith's project: his diagnosis of the ethical ills of commercial societies and the remedy he advanced to cure them. Focusing on Smith's analysis of the psychological and social ills endemic to commercial society - anxiety and restlessness, inauthenticity and mediocrity, alienation and individualism - it argues that Smith sought to combat corruption by cultivating the virtues of prudence, magnanimity, and beneficence. The result constitutes a new morality for modernity, at once a synthesis of commercial, classical, and Christian virtues and a normative response to one of the most pressing political problems of Smith's day and ours. Ryan Patrick Hanley is Assistant Professor of Political Science at Marquette University. His research in the history of political philosophy has appeared in the American Political Science Review, the American Journal of Political Science, the Review of Politics, History of Political Thought, the European Journal of Political Theory, and other academic journals and edited volumes. He is also the editor of the forthcoming Penguin Classics edition of Adam Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments, featuring an introduction by Amartya Sen, and a co-editor, with Darrin McMahon, of The Enlightenment: Critical Concepts in History.

Table of Contents

Prefacep. ix
Acknowledgmentsp. xi
Abbreviationsp. xv
Introductionp. 1
The Problem: Commerce and Corruptionp. 15
Smith's Defense of Commercial Societyp. 15
What Is Corruption? Political and Psychological Perspectivesp. 24
Smith on Corruption: From the Citizen to the Human Beingp. 36
The Solution: Moral Philosophyp. 53
Liberal Individualism and Virtue Ethicsp. 53
Social Science versus Moral Philosophyp. 57
Two Types of Moral Philosophy: Natural Jurisprudence versus Ethicsp. 62
Three Types of Ethics: Utilitarianism, Denotology, and Virtue Ethicsp. 68
Virtue Ethics: Modern, Ancient, and Smitheanp. 78
Interlude: The What and the How of TMS VIp. 82
The What: Smith's "Practical System of Morality"p. 82
The How: Rhetoric, Audience, and the Methods of Practical Ethicsp. 86
The How: The Ascent of Self-Love in Three Stagesp. 92
Prudence, or Commercial Virtuep. 100
The Challenge: From Praise to Prudencep. 100
Educating the Vain: Fathers and Sonsp. 104
Self-Interest Rightly Understoodp. 109
The Advantages and Disadvantages of Prudencep. 123
Magnanimity, or Classical Virtuep. 132
The Problems of Prudence and the Therapy of Magnanimityp. 132
Up from Individualism: Desert, Praiseworthiness, Consciencep. 135
Modernity, Antiquity, and Magnanimityp. 151
The Dangers of Magnanimityp. 162
Beneficence, or Christian Virtuep. 175
Between Care and Caritasp. 175
Benevolence and Beneficence and the Human Telosp. 178
The Character and Purposes of the Wise and Virtuous Manp. 187
Wisdom and Virtue and Adam Smith's Apologyp. 202
Epilogue: The "Economy of Greatness"p. 209
Indexp. 213
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

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