ABSTRACT
Political theorists and philosophers say, ah yes, but Adam Smith is more than merely an economist. He was a moral philosopher who articulated an elegant theory of how morality develops and is refined in society, how sympathy and approbation guide our behavior, and how peoples understand and judge ourselves and others. Craig Smith distills a range of insights into clear lessons regarding Smith’s understanding of how theoretical beauty is a product of the coherence and parsimony, and highlights some unifying features of Smith’s evolutionary accounts of language, law, morality, and institutions. Schmidtz pulls together elements of Smith’s thinking to chart a new interpretation of what it takes to reconcile freedom and prosperity, and what conditions of opulence demand of the individual seeking a good life. Ryan Hanley has managed to bring together world-class scholars from variety of disciplinary backgrounds and ideological perspectives. The result is a uniquely valuable collection of essays that not only covers great expanse of Smith’s thought.
