Adam Smith's Case Against the British Empire

William Coleman ()

No 2, CEH Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic History, Research School of Economics, Australian National University

Abstract: The paper articulates Adam Smith's case that the British Empire is inimical to Great Britain's interest. It is argued, contrary to Smith, that under the structure of global trade that prevailed prior to the Industrial Revolution, the mercantilist restrictions on trade and capital movement that characterised the British Empire increased Britain's national income. But it is also argued, in agreement with Smith, that the military costs of enforcing these restrictions outweighed any benefit. Smith's 'cost of enforcement case' against the Empire rightly resonated among liberal critiques of Empire in the century after Smith. His proposals for political union to succeed the Empire were distorted by Imperial Federationists in the early 20th c.

Keywords: Adam Smith; British Empire; Mercantilism; Imperial Federation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-his and nep-hpe
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://cbe.anu.edu.au/researchpapers/CEH/WP202302.pdf

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:auu:hpaper:112

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEH Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic History, Research School of Economics, Australian National University Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().