The Scottish Enlightenment Sympathy and Social Welfare Jonathan Hearn Professor of Political and Historical Sociology School of Social and Political Science University of Edinburgh Structure ID: 162024
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Slide1
Once More With Feeling: The Scottish Enlightenment, Sympathy, and Social Welfare
Jonathan Hearn
Professor of Political and Historical Sociology
School of Social and Political Science
University of EdinburghSlide2
StructureI. Rediscovering the sentimental ScotsII. Examining sympathyIII. Implications of social welfareSlide3
I. Rediscovering the sentimental ScotsEmpiricismNaturalism
Causation
Bacon
Hume
SmithSlide4
II. Examining sympathySlide5
II. Examining sympathy
David HumeSlide6
II. Examining sympathy
“The
same principle produces, in many instances, our sentiments of morals, as well as those of beauty. No virtue is more
esteem’d
than justice, and no vice more detested than injustice; nor are there any qualities, which go farther to the fixing of the character, either as amiable or odious. Now justice is a moral virtue, merely because it has that tendency to the moral good of mankind; and indeed, is nothing but an artificial invention to that purpose. The same may be said of allegiance, of the laws of nations, of modesty, and of good manners. All of these are human contrivances for the interest of society. And since there is a very strong sentiment of morals, which has always attended them, we must allow, that the reflecting on the tendency of characters and mental qualities, is sufficient to give us the sentiments of approbation and blame. Now as the means to an end can only be agreeable, where the end is agreeable; and as the good of society, where our own interest is not
concern’d
, or that of our friends, pleases only by sympathy: It follows that sympathy is the source of the esteem, which we pay to all the artificial
virtues” (Hume 1978
: 577). Slide7
II. Examining sympathy“How
selfish
soever
man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it except the pleasure of seeing
it” (Smith 1984
: 9).Slide8
II. Examining sympathy
Adam SmithSlide9
II. Examining sympathyTwo further issues:
Propinquity matters.
The bias of sympathySlide10
III. Implications for social welfareSocial welfare then and now‘The culture of poverty’
Social distance
From social engineering to the analysis of sentiment?Slide11
References Berry, Christopher J. (1997) Social Theory of the Scottish Enlightenment
. Edinburgh: EUP
.
Hume, David (1975)
Enquiries Concerning Human Understanding and Concerning the Principles of Morals
, 3
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edn
, P. H. Nidditch (ed.), Oxford: Oxford UP
.Hume, David (1978)
A Treatise of Human Nature, 2nd
edn
, P. H.
Nidditch
(
ed
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.
Lewis, Oscar (1966) ‘The Culture of Poverty’,
Scientific American
215(4): 19-25
.
Mounce
, H. O. (1999)
Hume’s Naturalism
. London:
Routledge
.
Roberts, Russ (2014)
How Adam Smith can Change Your Life
. London: Penguin
.
Sen
,
Amartya
(2011) ‘Keynote Address: Uses and Abuses of Adam Smith’,
History of Political Economy
43:2
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Smith, Adam (1981)
An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
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vols
, R. H. Campbell and A. S. Skinner (
eds
), Indianapolis: Liberty Fund
.
Smith, Adam (1984)
The Theory of Moral Sentiments
, D. D Raphael and A. L.
Macfie
(
eds
), Indianapolis: Liberty Fund.