The Pleasure of Exchange: Adam Smith’s Third Kind of Self-Love

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.

Adam Smith and the Wealth-Worshipping Spectator

“…114). The desire to be admirable is not necessarily divorced from the desire for actual admiration: most virtuous people, according to Smith, want both to be excellent and to be recognized for it (TMS III.2.8, p. 117;III.2.28, p. 127;Bee, 2021).…”

“…The 1790 edition argues that admiration for the excellence of others necessarily disposes us to emulation, “the anxious desire that we ourselves should excel.” The anxious desire is not merely to be “admired for what other people are admired” but also to be “admirable for what they are admirable” ( TMS III.2.3, p. 114). The desire to be admirable is not necessarily divorced from the desire for actual admiration: most virtuous people, according to Smith, want both to be excellent and to be recognized for it ( TMS III.2.8, p. 117; III.2.28, p. 127; Bee 2021).…”

IDLENESS AND THE VERY SPARING HAND OF GOD: THE INVISIBLE TIE BETWEEN HUME’SDIALOGUES CONCERNING NATURAL RELIGIONAND SMITH’SWEALTH OF NATIONS

“… 5 For reasons of length, I cannot deal with the various interpretations of Smith’s self-interest (Young 1997; Paganelli 2008; Slegers 2018; Maurer 2019; Werhane 2019), and neither can I consider the effect of other economic anthropological elements, such as the “desire to better one’s conditions” (Paganelli 2009) or “the desire of deserved esteem” (Bee 2021) for idleness. However, I believe my argument holds even if one were to adopt these alternative perspectives. …”