THE PLEASURE OF EXCHANGE: ADAM SMITH’S THIRD KIND OF SELF-LOVE

Michele Bee

Journal of the History of Economic Thought, 2021, vol. 43, issue 1, 118-140

Abstract: This article argues that the self-love that motivates exchange in The Wealth of Nations (WN) can be seen as the desire for deserved approval discussed by Adam Smith in The Theory of Moral Sentiments (TMS). This often overlooked desire appears in TMS as the most representative kind of self-love. Exchange motivated by this desire emerges as the way to find confirmation through others’ appraisal of one’s own self-assessment, and thus to find an agreed-upon measure for respective deserved praise. The target in this economic relationship is that equivalence that signals mutual recognition of deserved esteem. Equivalence here is the aim and not the result of exchange, unlike a tug-of-war, where both parties try to give as little and gain as much as possible regardless of the recognition each deserves.

Date: 2021
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