著者

服部 正治 Robert Chapeskie 小林 昇

出版者

The Japanease Society for the History of Economic Thought

雑誌

経済学史研究 (ISSN:18803164)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.59, no.1, pp.63-90, 2017 (Released:2019-09-01)

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Introduction by Masaharu Hattori The late Noboru Kobayashiʼs “Historical Critique in Wealth of Nations: A Per-spective on Books III and IV,” translated here into English, was originally pub-lished in Japanese in Fukushima Universityʼs Shōgaku Ronsyū (The Journal of Commerce, Economics and Economic History), Vol. 41, No. 5, 1973, and re-printed in Volume 2, which is indicated as 《II》 in this translation, 1976, of The Works of Kobayashi Noboru on the History of Economic Thought, 11 Volumes, 1976-1989, Tokyo: Miraisha. The “Historical Critique” of the title of this article has a double meaning when it comes to its content. In one sense, it refers to Smithʼs criticism of history that goes against the natural progress of opulence and has been seen in Europe “after the fall of the Roman Empire” that is de-scribed in Book III of Wealth of Nations. In another sense, it refers to Kobaya-shiʼs criticism of the defect inherent in Smithʼs historical understanding. When it comes to the latter, Smith did not sufficiently recognize the historical fact that the mercantilist protectionism of the Government of the civil revolutions (par-ticularly the Glorious Revolution) in Britain protected and fostered the devel-opment of domestic industrial capital, bringing about the bi-polar separation of independent producers that advanced the development of the primitive accumu-lation of capital and eventually led to the establishment of the capitalist system. Kobayashiʼs historical critique can thus be summarized as pointing out Smithʼs flawed understanding of the historical significance of mercantilism.