Sample: Ott Paper Proposal

Sample: OTT PAPER PROPOSAL

Discipline area for paper:     History

Broad area of inquiry:          Economic history / Intellectual history

Narrower topic idea:             The original intentions and ideas of capitalist theory.

Possible questions to pursue:

• What were the original ideas of capitalism as formulated by Adam Smith as the “father of capitalism”?
• Smith treated economics in An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth Of Nations (1776), but also addressed ethics in The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759), and the role of government in Lectures on Jurisprudence (1762-1763). To what extent do Smith’s views on ethics, politics and economics relate to each other? 
• To what extent is capitalism as we know it today consistent or inconsistent with the original vision of Adam Smith?
• If Smith were alive today, what would he think of the size and reach of global corporations?  Was there anything in Smith’s world in the 18th century that resembled the sorts of things we have today in global corporations?

Preliminary bibliography (with 3 items annotated):

Annotated items

Adam Smith Institute.  <http://www.adamsmith.org>
The Adam Smith Institute, founded in the 1970s, is a modern-day think tank devoted to libertarian and free-market ideas.  My interest in the site mainly would be to compare the convictions held by Adam Smith with perspectives of those who today claim to be operating in the Adam Smith tradition.

Smith, Adam.  The Theory of Moral Sentiments.  New York: Cosimo Classics, 2007.
Originally published in 1759, Adam’s Smith’s key work on ethics sets forth sympathy as the key motivator for moral behavior. We care about the well-being of others simply for the sake of seeing them happy (because we understand what it is like to be happy).  We wince when seeing the pain of other persons.  Our natural sympathy calls upon us to care for others as we care for ourselves.  Smith’s economic theories on the motivating power of self-interest (as presented in Wealth of Nations) must be balanced with these commitments to the interests of others as described in his ethical theories.

Werhane, Patricia.  Adam Smith’s Legacy for Ethics and Economics.  Cambridge: Judge Institute of Management Studies, 1997.
Smith is said to have favored getting out of the way of commerce completely and letting the “invisible hand” of laissez-faire economics have free reign.   Patricia Werhane questions this view of Smith, seeing it as a caricature rather than a realistic impression. Werhane contends that while Smith "appears to separate the economic actor in the Wealth of Nations from the ordinary moral person to whom he devotes his earlier work" (3), this is simply a way of dividing material thematically for study, the way we might have separate courses in ethics, politics, economics.  To understand Smith accurately, one needs to keep the whole of his moral and economic theory in mind at the same time.


Additional items

Dankert, Clyde E., compiler.  Thoughts from Adam Smith.  Lunenberg VT: Stinehour Press, 1963.

Goodpaster, Kenneth and John Matthews, Jr.  “Can a Corporation Have a Conscience?”  Harvard Business Review (January-February 1982).  Reprinted in Ethical Issues in Business: A Philosophical Approach, 3rd edition, T.Donaldson and P.Werhane, editors.  Englewood Cliffs NJ: Prentice Hall, 1988, 139-149.

Kilcullen, R.J.  Adam Smith: The Moral Sentiments.  Sydney: Macquarie University, 1996.  Available at: <http://www.humanities.mq.edu.au/Ockham/y64l01.html>

Singer, Peter.  One World: The Ethics of Globalization.  New Haven CT:  Yale University Press, 2002.

Smith, Adam.  An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.  La Vergne TN:  Simon and Brown, 2012.

__________.  Lectures on Jurisprudence. Lexicos Publishing (e-book), 2012.

Werhane, Patricia.  Adam Smith and His Legacy for Modern Capitalism.  New York: Oxford University Press, 1991.

Wilson, Loretta and Susan Kwilecki.  “Economics and Religion: A Bridge Too Far?”  College Teaching 48 (Fall, 2000): 147-150.