Adam Smith: and the Pursuit of Perfect Liberty [Paperback]

James Buchan (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Profile Books (May 10, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1861979401
• ISBN-13: 978-1861979407
• Product Dimensions: 7.4 x 5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,066,041 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Delightful little myth buster, April 5, 2008

By 

H. Schneider "Hamlet" (Pandistan) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Adam Smith and the Pursuit of Liberty (Hardcover)

Surprise in my shelf. I can't recall that I bought this book. I think it was a gift from the Economist for letting them pester me with a survey some time ago. It does not seem to be in the normal book trade. Is it a short version of a longer bio on Smith that came out later? Don't know at the moment.
Buchan's message is that Smith has been misappropriated by all sides.
Advocate of laissez faire? He did not use these words anywhere. Praising the invisible hand for the strengths of capitalism? The term 'invisible hand' shows up 3 times in the whole oeuvre, but never means what we assume it meant. We might as well have selected Defoe's working girl Moll Flanders for starting economics. She also spoke of the 'invisible hand'.
Smith was no free trade doctrinaire. He was not an economist, such a thing did not exist yet. He did not write about capitalism, such a concept was still unheard of.
It seems that the former British finance minister and current prime minister, who happens to be a country man of Smith, and happens to be called Giordano Bruno or something like that, has made an effort to claim Smith for some kind of Caledonian Socialism. Buchan dismisses such silliness.
Buchan makes a strong effort to launch Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments as a philosophical effort of equal importance with the Wealth of Nations. Possibly you need a more detailed bio if you really want to dig in. Buchan published one a year after this little book. Anyway, if you find this one somewhere, don't despise it.
(Buchan thinks that British economists and journalists are as literate and knowledgeable as English footballers. Can't help giggling, thinking about the standard Beckham interview...)