Adam Smith is now widely regarded as ‘the father of modern economics’ and the most influential economist who ever lived — yet what he actually believed, and what his ideas truly mean, remains fiercely contested. Was he a champion of individual freedom and capitalism? A driver of ‘market fundamentalism’ and an apologist for inequality and human selfishness? Or something else entirely? Jesse Norman’s brilliantly conceived study sets out to answer these questions, giving us not merely Smith’s economics but his vastly wider intellectual project.
Set against the turbulent backdrop of Enlightenment Scotland, the book offers a succinct and highly engaging account of Smith’s life and times, reviews his work as a whole and traces his influence across two centuries of thought — from Karl Marx and Charles Darwin to John Maynard Keynes and Friedrich Hayek. It dispels the myths and debunks the caricatures that have long distorted Smith’s legacy, exploring his ideas in depth across ethics, law, economics and government. Far from being a simple economist, Smith emerges here as one of the founders of modern social psychology and behavioural theory. And far from fitting the ‘libertarian’ or ‘neoliberal’ labels too often applied to him, he turns out to offer a strikingly modern evolutionary theory of political economy — one that recognises the often complementary roles of markets and the state.
At a moment when politics and economics are ever more polarised, Norman’s Smithian analysis of contemporary markets, predatory capitalism and the 2008 financial crash returns us to first principles. Through Smith’s work, this book addresses enduring questions of inequality, human dignity and exploitation, and makes a compelling case for why he remains central to any serious attempt to defend, reform or renew the market system.
‘A superb book’ Financial Times, Books of the Year
ISBN 13: 9780141987118
Author: Jesse Norman
