Liberal economic discourse on colonial practices and the rejection of the British Empire (1750-1815)1

Alain Clément

The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, 2014, vol. 21, issue 4, 583-604

Abstract: In the mid-eighteenth century, colonisation was criticised on the grounds that profits from it were captured by private merchants that the colonies prospered in spite of not because of colonial policy, and that benefits accrued to the colonies and other foreign nations but not to the home country. The empire came at a cost that did not obviously outweigh its benefits. The solutions proposed tended towards relinquishing the colonial empire. This is relatively clear in the writings of Burke, Anderson and Tucker but less so in those of Smith, who advocated not independence (for which public opinion was unprepared) but free trade between the colonies and the home country.

Date: 2014
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DOI: 10.1080/09672567.2012.708766

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