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“The Greatest and Noblest of all Characters”: Knowledge, Improvements, and Smith’s “Science of the Legislator”

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Sturn, R. “The Greatest and Noblest of all Characters”: Knowledge, Improvements, and Smith’s “Science of the Legislator”. Journal of Contextual Economics – Schmollers Jahrbuch, 99999(), 1-24. https://doi.org/10.3790/schm.2024.383297
Sturn, Richard "“The Greatest and Noblest of all Characters”: Knowledge, Improvements, and Smith’s “Science of the Legislator”" Journal of Contextual Economics – Schmollers Jahrbuch 99999., 2024, 1-24. https://doi.org/10.3790/schm.2024.383297
Sturn, Richard (2024): “The Greatest and Noblest of all Characters”: Knowledge, Improvements, and Smith’s “Science of the Legislator”, in: Journal of Contextual Economics – Schmollers Jahrbuch, vol. 99999, iss. , 1-24, [online] https://doi.org/10.3790/schm.2024.383297
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“The Greatest and Noblest of all Characters”: Knowledge, Improvements, and Smith’s “Science of the Legislator”

Sturn, Richard

Journal of Contextual Economics – Schmollers Jahrbuch, Vol. (2024), Online First : pp. 1–24

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Article Details

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Duncker & Humblot
DOI
https://doi.org/10.3790/schm.2024.383297
Language
Multiple languages
Pages
24
Keywords

Author Details

Richard Sturn, Graz Schumpeter Centre, University of Graz Universitaetsstrasse 15/4E 8010 Graz, Austria

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Abstract

Adam Smith’s science of the legislator and the “virtues of the statesman” are understood as a kind of higher order-liberalism, coming close to what Colander and Freedman call “the liberal methodology” pertinent to the role of economics in policy-making. Evolving socio-economic heterogeneities, the dynamism of specialisation and politics require a kind of dynamic, open, and contextual second-best approach, based on acknowledging the limits of system and historical contingencies – incompatible with technocratic scientism, utopian perfectionism, and reckless experimentation. I discuss reasons why the science of the legislator “died” (D. Winch), and did not become part of the modern mainstream, even though it has been re-invented time and again.

Table of Contents

Section Title Page Action Price
By Richard Sturn: “The Greatest and Noblest of all Characters”: Knowledge, Improvements, and Smith’s “Science of the Legislator” 1
1. Against Technocratic Hubris, Reckless Experimentation, Mercantilist Rent-Seeking: Smith’s Higher Order Liberalism 1
2. Classical Beyond Noble Simplicity: High-Flying “Men of System,” Vicissitudes of “Liberal Methodology” 5
3. Power of Science, Limits of Systems 8
4. Demand Side: Making Sense of the Limits of Systems Is a Rare Virtue 12
5. Architectonic Fault-Lines: Carving-Out Allocation as the Core of Scientific Economics 13
6. Is Progress in Economics a Substitute for the “Virtues of the Statesman”? 16
7. Second-Best Liberalism and Hobbesian Shadows 18
8. Concluding Remarks 20
References 22

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