Daniel Klein on the Derivation of "Liberalism" in the Scottish Enlightenment

Daniel Klein, a professor of economics at George Mason University, where he directs the Smithian Political Economy program, and a fellow at the Ratio Institute, posts in “The Atlantic” HERE

“Thanks to digitization, we can now establish when the word “liberal” first took on a political meaning. For centuries it had had what scholars have called pre-political meanings, such as generous, tolerant, or suitable to one of noble or superior status—as in “liberal arts” and “liberal education.”  But now using Google’s Ngram Viewer we can see what the word “liberal”—as an adjective—was used to modify. Up to 1769 the word was used only in pre-political ways, but in and around 1769 such terms as “liberal policy,” “liberal plan,” “liberal system,” “liberal views,” “liberal ideas,” and “liberal principles” begin sprouting like flowers. …

My research with Will Fleming finds that the Scottish historian William Robertson appears to be the most significant innovator, repeatedly using “liberal” in a political way, notably in a book published in 1769. (I presented more details in a lecture at the Ratio Institute, viewable on You Tube  HERE [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXNsk3A0CF8]“ 

Of the Hanseatic League, for example, Robertson spoke of “the spirit and zeal with which they contended for those liberties and rights,” and how a society of merchants, “attentive only to commercial objects, could not fail of diffusing over Europe new and more liberal ideas concerning justice and order. Robertson’s friend and fellow Scot Adam Smith used “liberal” in a similar sense in The Wealth of Nations, published in 1776. If all nations, Smith says, were to follow “the liberal system of free exportation and free importation,” then they would be like one great cosmopolitan empire, and famines would be prevented. Then he repeats the phrase: “But very few countries have entirely adopted this liberal system.

Smith’s “liberal system” was not concerned solely with international trade. He used “liberal” to describe application of the same principles to domestic policy issues. Smith was a great opponent of restrictions in the labor market, favoring freedom of contract, and wished to see labor markets “resting on such liberal principles.”

Comment

Readers who follow my recomendation that the read Dan Klein’s thoughts in the paper and on You Tube at the Ration Institute will be treated to a vintage and typically authoritative read from Daniel and, should they choose to do so, an enlightening account of an oft neglected account of importance to those interested in the Scottish Enlightenment and, of course, Adam Smith.

Daniel and I have long had debates on our different interpretations of the use by Adam Smith of the invisible hand metaphor since we met at Balliol College, Oxford, Adam Smith’ college in 2009 (see Lost Legacy since 2009).