Moral sentiments and jurisprudence
The first published book of Smith, which appeared in 1752, when he then held a chair in philosophy, was The Theory of Moral Sentiments (hereafter TMS, Smith, 1984). The underlying theme is the relationship between commercialization and morals, the old question of whether complex societies can develop sound morals (Habermas, 1986).
On the surface, Smith discusses different ethical theories and tries to reconcile them: the theory of propriety (Aristotle, Plato, Zeno), the theory of prudent private individualism in the tradition of Epicurus and the theories of the inborn inclination of the happiness of others (Hutcheson, Shaftesbury). The result is much more diverse than is usually presented in today’s textbooks. Smith’s contemporaries, such as Hume (Smith, 1977, pp. 33 and 43) and Edmund Burke (‘you are in some few places... rather a little too diffuse’, ibid., p. 47) were well aware of the tensions in the book.Smith criticizes the polar approaches of Thomas Hobbes and Bernard Mandeville (an egoistical-rationalistic and utilitarian individualism) and the authors of the ‘happiness of others’ approach, although he shares the starting point of their reasoning. Hutcheson remarked in 1785: ‘the truest, most constant, and lively pleasure, the happiest enjoyment of life consists in kind affections to our fellow-creatures, gratitude and love to the Deity, submission to his will, and trust in his providence, with a course of suitable actions. This is the true good to our power. other pleasures seem almost to vanish when separated from them’ (Hutcheson, 1989, pp. 64-5). It is not surprising that some interpreters saw a contradiction (the so-called ‘A. Smith problem’) between Smith’s truck-and-barter man in The Wealth of Nations (1976, Vol. I, pp. 17-18) and this emotionally driven social man, deriving moral rules inductively and by the sentiment of identification.
But the fact that Immanuel Kant’s rational and empty golden rule was influenced by Smith may serve as a first warning: the TMS, although having the same starting point as in Hutcheson, became something very different in the course of exposition.Smith’s analysis starts with his often recognized core statement: ‘How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it except the pleasure of seeing it’ (Smith, 1984, p. 9). He talks about benevolence in the sense of Arthur Schopenhauer, ‘a fellow-feeling with suffering’ (ibid., p. 43) or more generally: humans have sympathy for each other in the sense that they each take the position of the other as a basis of moral conduct and see their own actions as an uncommitted impartial spectator. This is the ‘mirrorglass-self’ idea, which has been developed in symbolic interactionism in the tradition of William J. Cooley, Charles Horton Thomas and G.H. Mead. This indicates that Smith’s book deals more with a general theory of socialization than with ethics and morals only (compare especially his statements in Smith, 1984, pp. 24-5 and 110-12), based on ‘the faculty of speech, the characteristical faculty of human nature’ (ibid., p. 336). Smith does not doubt the empathy concept, but as a sceptical Scottish intellectual he questions and discusses the dominant motive force of individual action. The main spearhead of his discussion is to make the benevolent assumption relative and to introduce other inclinations and driving forces to arrive at a more general, less pleasant but more realist picture of human behaviour.
He first generalizes the sympathy concept, stating that it can be combined ‘with any passion whatever’ (ibid., p. 10) to dissociate the capability of sympathy/taking the role of the other and benevolence. For example, torturers often seem to feel pleasure through sympathy in this generalized sense.
Second, Smith frequently includes the motives of action (not their results), but they may be negative in the case of antisocial motives. Third, in the case of benevolent sympathy, a strong fellow-feeling may be counterfactual and exaggerated; this holds in the case of pity with dead persons (ibid., p. 13). Fourth, he observes that sympathy for oneself and for others has a significantly different intensity: for others it is much less and has the tendency ‘to fall short’ (ibid., p. 21). Fifth, people may be too affectionate and then they may be ‘unfit for the world’ (ibid., 1984, p. 40). Sixth, sympathy/empathy can be (mis)used in favour of strategic action to manipulate others. Seventh, if nobody watches us and we can pass over the demonstration of sympathy without recognition, we may feel no sorrow (ibid., p. 44). Eighth, ranking, and the disposition to admire, perverts and misdirects sympathy because we feel sorrow for the rich, but we evade seeing the sorrow of the poor (ibid., p. 51), which is a universal cause of moral corruption, flattery and falsehood (ibid., p. 61). But Smith does not criticize this in his realist mood. He states that this ethically dubious habit of selective neglect is ‘necessary both to establish and maintain the distinction of ranks and the order of society’ (ibid.). Finally, Smith’s book turns out to be less a theory of moral sentiments but a critical exposition of the complexity of human behaviour, much cooler than Hutcheson’s benevolence concept, sometimes nearer to the concept of an ‘indifferent spectator’ (ibid, pp. 157-8).No definite answer is given to the three main questions: why does moral behaviour evolve when I take the position of the other; is there an objective standard of motives in the sense of merit/demerit (authority, customs, fashion, reason a la Kant, and God - all these possibilities are taken into consideration); and how does the impartial spectator gain independence from the judgements of other people (Smith talks about the great guardian, the mind’s eye and an independent inner voice in an unsystematic way)? In the tradition of the Scottish enlightenment, the raising of the question and throwing into relief its complexity is more important than definite answers.
But in search of definite results we may make two assertions. First, according to Smith, human beings have a general sense of empathy/sympathy, to evaluate their own behaviour and the actions of others in a relatively detached sense as a basic requirement of social trust and cooperation. In larger societies where value generalization takes place, this is a prerequisite of the functioning of a market and civil society (often lacking in countries in transition like those of Eastern Europe; see Putnam, 1993; UNDP, 1996, chs 2 and 5). Second, human agents have positive and negative behavioural dispositions, some benevolent, some not.At this point, Smith’s structural discussion sets in and law becomes important. In larger and more complex societies like the emerging British capitalist system, which transcend face-to-face and kinship relationships which have been regulated by ‘love and affection, esteem, friendship, gratitude’ (like the Highland clans in Scotland), social relations are now ‘among different men, as among different merchants, from a sense of its utility, without any mutual love or affection... Society cannot subsist unless the laws of justice are tolerably observed. the enforcement of the laws of justice by the punishment of those who violated them’ (Smith, 1984, pp. 86-7). These laws of justice are beyond doubt and subjective interpretation. Smith mentions the case of the repayment of a loan, where the rule of law is ‘precise, accurate, and indispensable’, whereas the rules ‘of charity, of generosity, of gratitude, of friendship, are in many respects loose and inaccurate’ (ibid., pp. 174-5).
Here is the bridge between his non-contradictory theory of the human condition, morals, civil development, law and the prerequisites of a market economy. Smith gave his lectures on jurisprudence in 1762-63; they were discovered and first published by Cannan in 1896 (see Pesciarelli, 1986). The subject is much broader than the title might suggest: ‘Jurisprudence is the theory of the rules by which civil governments ought to be directed’ (Smith, 1982, p.
5). Politics is not reduced to the legal framing of efficient market allocation: ‘The first and chief design of every system of government is to maintain justice... To prevent the members of a society from incroaching on one another’s property, or seizing what is not their own’ (ibid.). Therefore police, taxes and (national) defence are necessary to secure citizens from injury (body, reputation or estate). He differentiates between property as an exclusive right and ‘the giving up some part of the full right of property’, such as a public road that cuts up a farm (ibid., p. 10), an attenuation of property rights he considers necessary in more complex societies. His definition of property as ‘to be considered as an exclusive right by which we can hinder any other person from using in any shape what we possess’ (ibid.) and his examples such as patents resemble to a high degree the institutionalist approach (Commons, 1924) and the social law school in Germany (Schmoller, 1900/1904; Stammler, 1921).Natural rights are considered as ‘evident to reason, without any explanation’, for example ‘that a man has received an injury when he is wounded or hurt any way’ (Smith, 1982, p. 13). In contradistinction to natural rights philosophers like Locke, and typically of the Scottish approach, he mentions a very interesting exception: property! This is developed by the sociohistorical ways of occupation, tradition, accession, prescription and succession. Smith describes it here without any tendency to legitimization as natural and justly acquired:
The only case where the origin of natural rights is not altogether plain, is in that of property. It does not at first appear evident that, e.g. any thing which may suit another as well or perhaps better than it does me, should belong to me exclusively of all others barely because I have got it into my power; as for instance, that an apple, which no doubt may be as agreable [sic] and as usefull to an other as it is to me, should be altogether appropriated to me and all others excluded from it merely because I had pulled it out of the tree.
(Ibid.)The long discussion of the apple acquisition aims at debunking all imaginable ‘natural explanations’ regarding to whom the apple belongs. The arguments in favour of property are due to Scottish pragmatism: property is good because the unnecessary trouble of dividing the product can be avoided, it cuts off a number of disputes.
Almost like the Historical school (for the early reception of Smith on the continent, see Palyi, 1966), Smith differentiates four stages in history: the ages of hunters, of shepherds, of agriculture and of commerce (Smith, 1982, p. 14; see Stein, 1979). Different densities of population lead to different systems of production and laws: Smith argues in an almost Marxian deter- minist way. Different systems require different laws and definitions of property. For Smith, the historical trend is not a weakening of government in the process of civilization, but the other way round: ‘The progress of government and the punishment of crimes is always much the same with that of society, or at least is greatly dependent on it. In the first stages of society, when government is weak, no crimes are punished; the society has not sufficient strength to embolden it to intermeddle greatly in the affairs of individuals’ (Smith, 1982, p. 129). The more advanced societies are, the greater is the necessary density of regulation, according to Smith: ‘The more improved any society is and the greater length the severall means of supporting the inhabitants are carried, the greater will be the number of their laws and regulations necessary to maintain justice, and prevent infringements of the right of property’ (ibid., p. 16). Property therefore solves problems but it also provokes new ones, so that the legal extension of private property becomes a relative and incremental thing: ‘Property is then after reaching stages with more private property, introduced, and many disputes on that head must inevitably occur’ (ibid., p. 203). One consequence is the polarization of riches and the weakening of democratic decision processes: ‘The rich men who have large possessions... would as I observed have many dependents who would follow their council [sic] and direction, and in this manner they would have the greatest influence over the people’ (ibid.). From this perspective, the result is that the rich protect themselves from attacks by the poor, who obey them because they accept their authority and interest. Smith explicitly criticizes social contract theories. Citizens more resemble sleeping people who have been brought on ship, awakening out at sea when it is too late to decide to leave. All this does not sound like ‘natural state of liberty’ arguments as Smith has very often been interpreted - or did his approach undergo fundamental changes in The Wealth of Nations?