Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Prologue: The Purpose of This Work
- 1 Adam Smith's Moral Philosophical Vision: The Context of His Economic Analysis
- 2 The Wealth of Nations: Book I
- 3 The Wealth of Nations: Books II and III
- 4 The Wealth of Nations: Book IV
- 5 The Wealth of Nations: Book V
- Epilogue: Adam Smith and Laissez-Faire
- References
- Index
5 - The Wealth of Nations: Book V
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 September 2015
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Prologue: The Purpose of This Work
- 1 Adam Smith's Moral Philosophical Vision: The Context of His Economic Analysis
- 2 The Wealth of Nations: Book I
- 3 The Wealth of Nations: Books II and III
- 4 The Wealth of Nations: Book IV
- 5 The Wealth of Nations: Book V
- Epilogue: Adam Smith and Laissez-Faire
- References
- Index
Summary
INTRODUCTION
In his “Introduction and Plan of the Work,” Smith describes Book V as covering:
• the “necessary expences of the sovereign, or commonwealth” (WN, 12) and who should pay each of these expenses;
• “the different methods in which the whole society may be made to contribute towards defraying the expences incumbent on the whole society, and what are the principal advantages and inconveniencies of each of those methods” (WN, 12); and
• why “almost all modern governments … contract debts, and what have been the effects of those debts” (WN, 12) on the wealth of nations.
But this is more than a book about revenue. As Smith examines the optimal methods for financing the roles of government that he laid out at the close of Book IV, he develops the content of those roles and explores how their optimal implementation evolves as society evolves.
CHAPTER 1: “OF THE EXPENCES OF THE SOVEREIGN OR COMMONWEALTH”
Part I: “Of the Expence of Defence”
The first duty of the sovereign, that of protecting the society from the violence and invasion of other independent societies, can be performed only by means of a military force. But the expence both of preparing this military force in time of peace, and of employing it in time of war, is very different in the different states of society, in the different periods of improvement. (WN, 689)
Again, Smith's four stages theory of progress frames his analysis. In the first, rude state of hunting “as we find it among the native tribes on North America” (WN, 690), the sovereign incurs no expense for defense because “there is properly neither sovereign nor commonwealth” (WN, 690). Every man is a hunter. The skills he masters as a hunter prepare him for the defense of the tribe and provide his maintenance in peace and in war.
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- Adam Smith's Wealth of NationsA Reader's Guide, pp. 170 - 252Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2015