Adam Smith

Ryan Patrick Hanley

Presents Adam Smith's influential treatise on social responsibility, advancing the principles of benevolence, justice, and sympathy.

The Theory of Moral Sentiments

Darrin M. McMahon

More than any earlier period of European intellectual history, the age of Enlightenment infused the republic of letters with social and political significance; this long-awaited new collection from Routledge brings together in five volumes the very best scholarship on the period and its legacy. It also incorporates historical and critical essays addressed to the Enlightenment' s alleged responsibility for institutions or policies prevalent in the twentieth century, including economic globalization and the Holocaust.

Critical Concepts in Historical Studies

The Enlightenment

Adam Smith (1723–90) is perhaps best known as one of the first champions of the free market and is widely regarded as the founding father of capitalism. From his ideas about the promise and pitfalls of globalization to his steadfast belief in the preservation of human dignity, his work is as relevant today as it was in the eighteenth century. Here, Ryan Hanley brings together some of the world's finest scholars from across a variety of disciplines to offer new perspectives on Smith's life, thought, and enduring legacy. Contributors provide succinct and accessible discussions of Smith's landmark works and the historical context in which he wrote them, the core concepts of Smith's social vision, and the lasting impact of Smith's ideas in both academia and the broader world. They reveal other sides of Smith beyond the familiar portrayal of him as the author of the invisible hand, emphasizing his deep interests in such fields as rhetoric, ethics, and jurisprudence. Smith emerges not just as a champion of free markets but also as a thinker whose unique perspective encompasses broader commitments to virtue, justice, equality, and freedom. An essential introduction to Adam Smith's life and work, this incisive and thought-provoking book features contributions from leading figures such as Nicholas Phillipson, Amartya Sen, and John C. Bogle. It demonstrates how Smith's timeless insights speak to contemporary concerns such as growth in the developing world and the future of free trade, and how his influence extends to fields ranging from literature and philosophy to religion and law.

His Life, Thought, and Legacy

This book examines the transformation of the traditional understanding of love by four key Enlightenment thinkers - Hume, Adam Smith, Rousseau and Kant.

Love's Enlightenment

This book revisits the moral and political philosophy of Adam Smith to recover his understanding of morality in a market age.

Adam Smith and the Character of Virtue

Invaluable wisdom on living a good life from the founder of modern economics Adam Smith is best known today as the founder of modern economics, but he was also an uncommonly brilliant philosopher who was especially interested in the perennial question of how to live a good life. Our Great Purpose is an illuminating guide to Smith's incomparable wisdom on how to live well, written by one of today's leading Smith scholars. Full of invaluable insights on topics ranging from happiness and moderation to love and friendship, Our Great Purpose enables modern readers to see Smith in an entirely new light—and along the way, learn what it truly means to possess an excellent character and lead a worthy life.

Adam Smith on Living a Better Life

Our Great Purpose

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

Books

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